266 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



various concentrations of alcohols through kidneys, washing 

 them out and estimating their respiratory powers and oxidase 

 content, the respective concentrations of ethyl, propyl and butyl 

 alcohols which first permanently injured the respiration were 

 approximately those which lack red blood corpuscles. The 

 oxidase was first affected by rather greater concentrations than 

 these, but it was completely destroyed by the same concentra- 

 tions which completely destroyed the gaseous metabolism. In 

 addition to destroying respiration and oxidase, the alcohols 

 caused great disintegration of the kidney tissues, so much so 

 that 9 to 29 per cent, of the total protein contents of the kidneys 

 were washed out during the half-hour's perfusion. 



Apart from respiratory processes, however, the action of 

 indophenol oxidase itself seems to depend on lipoid membranes. 

 Thus the writer 1 found that whilst increasing concentrations 

 of various alcohols and ketones, ether, chloroform, chloral 

 hydrate, and other narcotics have, up to a certain point, no action 

 upon the oxidase, at slightly greater concentrations they act 

 destructively on it, and at about twice the concentrations which 

 first affect it they destroy it completely. Now the concentrations 

 of narcotics acting in this way bear a nearly constant ratio to 

 the narcotising concentrations for tadpoles and other organisms, 

 and as in accordance with the Meyer-Overton hypothesis it is 

 generally supposed that such narcotics act by dissolving in the 

 lipoids of the cells, it looks as if the activity of the insoluble 

 indophenol oxidase is likewise dependent on lipoids. 



Though it must be admitted that up to the present it is 

 not definitely proved that the respiration of the tissues is 

 dependent on oxidases, it can be shown that at least a part 

 of it is independent of the continued vitality of the tissues. 

 Battelli and Stern 2 found that if fresh muscle, liver, kidney, 

 and other organs were minced up and were shaken with blood 

 or saline in presence of oxygen, they had at first a considerably 

 greater gaseous metabolism than when they formed parts of the 

 living animal. This " chief respiration," as they called it, rapidly 

 dwindled down and ceased in an hour or two. Doubtless it 

 depended on the continued vitality of the cells and cell fragments, 



1 Vernon, Biochem. Zeit. 47, p. 374, 1912 ; 51, p. I, 1913 ; 60, p. 202, 1914 ; 

 Battelli and Stern, ibid., 52, p. 226, 1913 ; 63, p. 369, 1914. 



2 Battelli and Stern, Joum. de Physiol, et de Path. gen. 1907, p. 410 ; Biochem. 

 Zeit. 21, p. 487, 1909. 



