134 URINARY BASES 



lated to no vain in the same way as is neurin to cholin. These 

 bases characteristically yield by cleavage trimethylamine 

 when distilled with alkali. 



Trimethylamine. In connection with the question 

 whether trimethylamine occurs as such in the urine, Takeda, 

 one of Kutscher's pupils, has brought forward the necessity 

 of employing a partial vacuum distillation method. The 

 residue of the urinary distillate taken up in dilute hydro- 

 chloric acid is separated into a fraction soluble in alcohol and 

 one insoluble in alcohol; and from the latter the gold 

 chloride combination of trimethylamine is obtained. 44 



Takeda found that preformed trimethylamine does not 

 exist in the urine of dogs and of horses, but may sometimes 

 be present in human urine; it, however, always appears 

 when alkaline ammoniacal fermentation takes place in urine. 



Erdmann was unable to detect trimethylamine in normal 

 fresh human urine. However, it has been learned that if the 

 urine is treated with concentrated sulphuric acid as if for 

 Kjeldahl estimation, and the fluid alkalinized after decolori- 

 zation and distilled, alkylamine, including trimethylamine, 

 passes over with the ammonia. 45 



The author's student, Kinoshita, 46 proceeded as follows: 

 He distilled off under lowered pressure the volatile amines 

 from the urine in presence of magnesia, taking them up in a 

 receiver containing dilute hydrochloric acid. In the 

 chloride residue which remained after evaporation of the 

 distillate, consisting mainly of ammonium chloride and a 

 small admixture of the chlorides of other volatile bases, the 

 amount of alkyl in nitrogen combination was determined by 

 the method of J. Herzig and H. Meyer, and as a conclusion 



"Takeda (Physiol. Instit., Marburg), Pfliiger's Arch., 129, 82, 1909. 



45 O. Folin, C. C. Erdmann (Waverley), Jour, of Biol. Chem., 3, 83, 1907; 

 8, 41, 57, 1910; 9, 85, 1911. 



46 T. Kinoshita (University Physiol. Instit., Vienna), Centralbl. f. 

 Physiol., 24, No. 17, 1910. 



