NUTRITION LABORATORY. 299 



INVESTIGATIONS IN PROGRESS. 



Metabolism in diabetes mellitus. — The advent of the unusual and 

 highly promising Allen treatment of diabetes has resulted in the devel- 

 opment of a large number of experimental problems which have 

 occupied our attention during the past year. The considerable amount 

 of time that Dr. Joslin has been able to give to this research and the 

 consequent greater activity in this line of investigation have led to the 

 accumulation of much new material The development of the clinical 

 respiration chamber has added greatly to our knowledge of the char- 

 acter of the metabolism in diabetes under various conditions of treat- 

 ment, and numerous important problems are being profitably studied. 

 The research on diabetes mellitus carried out in connection with the 

 Nutrition Laboratory has now reached such a state of development 

 that arrangements have been made by the New England Deaconess 

 Hospital to maintain diabetic patients in a separate house in which 

 provision has been made for the installation of a complete chnical 

 respu'ation chamber which will be used for further study. 



Metabolism of normal infants. — ^Arrangements have been made with 

 the Massachusetts Wet Nurse Directory for the use of a special room in 

 their building (within 100 yards of the Nutrition Laboratory) in which 

 researches may be conducted on normal infants,!, e., children of healthy, 

 approved wet nurses; it is thus hoped to extend our observations on 

 normal infants between the ages of one month and two years. This 

 investigation is conducted with the cooperation of Dr. F. B. Talbot. 



Metabolism during muscular ivork. — The research on the metabolism 

 incidental to walking, which was begun by Dr. Murschhauser during 

 1913-14, has been continued and greatly elaborated bj^ Professor H. 

 Monmouth Smith. The investigation during the last yesLV has included 

 the study of the metabolism of walking at varying speeds and grades. 

 Preliminary to this work, the apparatus was modified by the addition 

 of an extra large spirometer and work-adder attachment, so that not 

 only the respiration-rate but also the total lung ventilation can be 

 graphically recorded on a kymograph. Up to the present time grades 

 as high as 25 per cent and speeds of 80 meters per minute have been 

 studied. The treadmill described in the previous report has been used 

 and continues to give satisfactory results. The simultaneous record- 

 ing of the oxygen consumption and carbon-dioxide production, the dis- 

 tance walked, the number of steps, the character of the step, the height 

 to which the body is raised both during the entire experiment and at 

 each particular step, the character and rate of respiration and the pulse- 

 rate of a man walking at a rapid rate, either on a level or on varying 

 grades, uislj now be said to be satisfactorily accomplished. The work 

 with the respiration apparatus is preliminary to a future study, in which 

 the subject and the treadmill will be placed inside of a specially con- 

 structed calorimeter. 



