MEMOIRS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 



287 



diet, as found by ;i considerable number of experiments,' with those of the alcohol as shown by 

 the expei'iments here reported. 



Table L8. — Comparison of availability {digestibility) and fuel values of nutrients of food in ordinary diet with thost of 



alcohol. 



The isodynamic values of alcohol, carbohydrates, and fats are thus in the ratios of 6.9 : 4 : 8.9, 

 and 1 gram of alcohol would be isodynamic with 1.73 grams carbohydrate or 0.78 gram of fats 

 of ordinary food materials. 



3. The proportions of food and of the several kinds of nutrients digested and made available 

 for use in the body were practically the same in the experiments with and those without alcohol in 

 the diet. The only difference worthy of mention was in the proportions of protein made available. 

 These were very slightly larger with the alcohol, but the difference was too small to be of 

 practical consequence. In all the expei'iments, both those with and those without alcohol, the 

 results agree very closely with those commonly found in digestion of food in ordinary mixed diet 

 by healthy men. 



■i. The potential energy of the alcohol was transformed into kinetic energy in the body as 

 complete!}" as that of the ordinary nutrients. The income and outgo of energy were equal in the 

 experiments without alcohol; the same was true in the experiments with alcohol. In all the 

 experiments the body obeyed the law of conservation of energy. 



5. With the exception of the energy of the external muscular work in the work experiments, 

 all of the energy of the food, including that of the alcohol, left the body as heat, and must 

 therefore have been transformed into heat within the body. Part of this total energy must have 

 been used for the internal mechanical (muscular) work; the energy thus used was therefore trans- 

 formed into heat before leaving the body. 



6. The radiation of heat from the body was very slightly greater with the alcohol diet than 

 with the ordinary diet, but the difference was extremely small — enough to make only about 1 

 per cent of the whole energy metabolized and not over 6 per cent of the energy of the alcohol. 



7. The efficiency of alcohol in the protection of body fat from consumption was very 

 evident. The losses of fat were no larger and the gains no smaller with the alcohol diet than 

 with the corresponding diet without alcohol. In this respect there was no indication of any 

 considerable difference between the alcohol and the nearly isodynamic amounts of fats and 

 carbohydrates which it replaced. This was the case in all the experiments. 



8. The efficiency of the alcohol in protecting body protein was evident, but it was not fully 

 equal in this respect to the isodynamic amounts of the ordinary nutrients. The results, however, 

 were not the same with the different subjects. With E. O., who had been accustomed to use 

 alcoholic beverages, the differences between the alcohol diet and the ordinary diet in their 

 apparent effects upon nitrogen metabolism were -mall. The figures showed a slightly larger 

 output of nitrogen with the alcohol, but the differences were not large enough to be of especial 

 significance. With A. W. S., who was unaccustomed to alcohol, its use in the place of other 



"See discussion of this subject by W. 0. Atwater and A. P. Bryant in the Report of the Storrs (Conn.) 

 Experiment Station for 1S99, from which the figures for ordinary nutrients in the table are taken. 



