FAT METABOLISM 



703 



liver is found to be infiltrated with fats, presumably to be handed on 

 elsewhere when worked up." It is interesting that the fetus is greedy 

 of unsaturated fatty acids. 



The most likely source of the fat transported to the liver is the fat pres- 

 ent in the depots, unless when digestion is in progress, when it may be 

 the fat from the intestine. That much of it comes from the depots is 

 easily demonstrated. Thus, the more extensive the infiltration of the 

 liver with fat, the more closely will this fat be found to agree with the 

 depot fat in its chemical characteristics. This has been very clearly 

 shown by, first of all, starving an animal so as to clear the depots of fat 

 as much as possible; then feeding it on some " ear-marked" fat (unusual 

 melting-point or a brominized fat) ; and after another day or so of 

 starvation, so as to clear the liver itself of fat, poisoning the animal 

 with phosphorus or phlorhizin. The liver w r ill be found shortly after- 

 wards to be invaded with fat which has all the ear-marks of that on 

 which the animal had been fed. 



Evidence of the same character has been furnished in a series of clin- 

 ical cases by observations on the amount of fat and the iodine value of 

 the fatty acid of the liver. This is shown in the accompanying table. 



FATTY ACIDS OF LIVER 



This table clearly shows that the more fat there is in the liver, the 

 nearer this fat approaches in character that stored in the depots. 



That some of the fat in the liver may come directly from the fat re- 

 cently absorbed from the intestine is also very readily demonstrable. 

 Thus, when cocoanut oil was placed in the intestine of anesthetized an- 

 imals, along with bile salts and glycerine, it was found by Raper 52 that 

 30 per cent of the* absorbed oil appeared in the liver. 



