406 MISSOURI AGRICULTURAL EXP. STA., RESEARCH BULLETIN NO. II 



It is thus seen that the yellow pigment of the skin secretions 

 of the Jersey cow is identical with the other yellow lipochromes of 

 the body and like them belongs chiefly to the carotin group of pig- 

 ments. 



THE BODY FAT AND BLOOD SERUM PIGMENTS OF THE NEW-BORN 



CALF. 



Carotin and xanthophylls having been found to be normal con- 

 stituents of the body fat of cows which had been fed green feeds or 

 other feeds containing an abundant amount of these pigments, an in- 

 teresting question was raised as to whether these pigments are present 

 in the body of the new-born calf. If these pigments should be found 

 to be entirely absent from the new-born calf, additional proof would 

 therefore be offered that these pigments were the result of subse- 

 quent feeding. The presence of carotin and xanthophylls in the new- 

 born calf, however, would not be proof that these pigments cannot 

 arise from the food, but would merely indicate that they were able 

 to traverse the placental barrier from the mother whose body is 

 normally rich in these pigments. In this connection the question 

 would be especially interesting in view of the fact that Mendel and 

 Daniels l have recently found that fat soluble dyes, such as Sudan 

 III, do not traverse the placental barrier of small animals such as 

 cats and rats, whose milk fat and body fat, however, is readily tinted 

 as the result of feeding the dyes. 



In order to study this question, the following experiment was 

 carried out: 



A new-born pure bred Jersey calf weighing 50 pounds was not 

 allowed to suckle its mother but was slaughtered a few hours after 

 its birth. 



Five hundred c. c. of the blood was caught in a cylinder and 

 allowed to clot. After standing 48 hours, 250 c. c. of serum was 

 obtained. The proteins were precipitated from the serum with al- 

 cohol and were filtered off on a Biicher funnel with suction. They 

 had a reddish gray color. They were rubbed up to a paste with 

 absolute alcohol in a mortar and then extracted with boiling abso- 

 lute alcohol. The extract was absolutely colorless. The alcoholic 

 filtrate from the precipitated proteins had a greenish-yellow color. 

 It was concentrated to 50 c. c. and absolute alcohol added, precipitat- 

 ing a little protein. The filtrate had a beautiful greenish-yellow color 

 but the pigment was not extracted by carbon bisulphide, petroleum 



1. Jour. Biol. Chem. 13 No. 1, p. 72 (1912). ~*** 



