128 METABOLISM AND GROWTH FROM BIRTH TO PUBERTY. 



heat production per square meter of body-surface are found with the 

 very young children. This is in conformity with variations observed 

 by us in our studies of new-born children, in which it was noted that 

 the heat production per square meter of body-surface decreased at 

 times to 459 calories. 1 When our early analysis of the figures for the 

 heat production of new-borns was made, our use of the Lissauer 

 formula for computing the body-surface was obviously open to some 

 criticism. Subsequently, as shown in another section of this report, 

 it was found that the Lissauer formula gives measurements agreeing 

 admirably with those of Du Bois for children weighing up to 10 kg. 

 During this early period from birth to 6 or 7 months, the body-weights 

 are for the most part under 10 kg. Hence we have every reason to 

 believe that our estimates of the heat production per square meter of 

 body-surface are as close as can possibly be made in the present state 

 of physiological science. 



The pronounced individuality of the children studied in these longer 

 series, as evidenced by the fluctuations in the smoothed curve, are 

 altogether too great to permit any consideration of a normally pro- 

 gressing, increasing metabolism. It is thus difficult to draw general 

 deductions from this extensive series of charts. Those permissible 

 are, first, the normally increasing body-weight common to all normal 

 children; second, the reasonably close paralleling of the total calories 

 with the body-weight curve, namely, an increase in total calories with 

 an increase in body-weight; third, the low calories found on the bases 

 of body-weight and body-surface shortly after birth, increasing to a 

 maximum not far from one to two years of age, with a tendency for 

 a definite decrease thereafter. Finally, the pulse-rate is noticeably 

 highest in the period from birth to 1 or 1| years, with a tendency to 

 fall thereafter. No perfect picture of the general physiological trend 

 can possibly be made from a visualization of these several groups of 

 data for the individual children. Final recourse must therefore be 

 made to our main study of a large number of children of different ages, 

 weights, lengths, and body-surfaces, so as to plot all values on large 

 charts and thus study the general trend. 



METABOLISM DURING GROWTH AS SHOWN BY GROUPS OF 



INDIVIDUAL DATA. 



In the preceding section it has been made clear that, with a given 

 individual, there is no smoothed curve for metabolism like that, for 

 example, obtained for body-weight with a fasting dog 2 or, indeed, with 

 a fasting man. Daily basal metabolism is subject to very considerable 

 fluctuations, which are nowhere more strikingly shown than in the 

 charts for individual children in figures 15 to 21. Plotting all the 



1 Benedict and Talbot, Carnegie Inst. Wash. Pub. No. 233, 1915, pp. 96 and 100. 



2 Benedict, Carnegie Inst. Wash. Pub. No. 203, 1915, pp. 77 and 75. 



