PREVIOUS INVESTIGATIONS. 37 



has recently been especially emphasized by many workers in metabo- 

 lism. The experiments were somewhat complicated by the facts that 

 the basal values were obtained but 6 or 7 hours after taking food rather 

 than the customary 12 hours, and that in all the food experiments the 

 metabolism had not reached the basal value 12 hours after the food was 

 taken. Nevertheless, the results are of great significance in indicating 

 the usual enormous increase in metabolism due to protein ingestion 

 which, in one instance, corresponded to an increase of practically two- 

 thirds of the caloric value of the protein ingested. In both the fat 

 and carbohydrate experiments the increases were much larger than 

 would commonly be expected, even though the caloric value of the ma- 

 terial ingested was in both cases much greater than that of protein. 

 In the observations on the tubercular patients Staehelin found similar 

 increases. With one patient there was a very much greater increase 

 after protein than with normal individuals, thus suggesting to Staehelin 

 that the protein ingestion has a specific influence upon tubercular 

 patients. 



von Willebrand, 1908. Although the observations were carried out 

 on obese patients rather than on normal individuals, the experiments 

 of von Willebrand 1 are of interest, since he studied the metabolism 

 both before and after the ingestion of sugar and protein. The experi- 

 ments have the single defect of the experiments made with the Sonden- 

 Tigerstedt chamber in that the oxygen consumption was not deter- 

 mined and the conclusions with regard to energy transformations are 

 accordingly based upon the carbon-dioxide excretion. This was found 

 for obese patients to be similar to the increase noted with healthy 

 persons, and von Willebrand concludes that the increase in metabolism 

 after food is just as great with obese as with normal individuals. The 

 fact that two of the subjects showed a relatively slight increase after 

 protein is less significant because of his statement that all of his sub- 

 jects were not as well trained to complete muscular repose as were those 

 of Koraen. 



Durig, 1909. With the accuracy characteristic of all his work, 

 Durig 2 reports a series of experiments made in Vienna and on Monte 

 Rosa, in which sugar was given, the main object of the experiments 

 being to study the influence of altitude upon the rise in metabolism 

 following the ingestion of sugar. The logical method of securing basal 

 values immediately preceding sugar was followed in all cases. In one 

 of the Vienna experiments, after 120 grams of glucose the heat output 

 increased from an average of 1.032 calories per minute to a maximum 

 of 1.338 calories in the first hour after the ingestion of sugar. At the 

 end of 5 hours the metabolism was still approximately 6 per cent above 

 the basal value. In one of the Monte Rosa experiments the heat out- 



von Willebrand, Skand. Arch. f. Physiol., 190S, 20, p. 152. 

 'Durig, Denkschr. d. Wiener Akad. d. Wis>s., 1909, 86, p. 116. 



