ROLE OF THE PANCREAS 217 



the tissue diastase and blood diastase and the source of the 

 latter. 



Role of the Pancreas in the Production of the Blood Dias- 

 tase. Observations showing that the amount of diastase in 

 milk in the first part of lactation may be from one to two 

 hundred times greater than that of the blood, 77 a clearly indi- 

 cate that the ferment, for the most part at least, cannot in 

 such cases come from the blood but rather from the tissues 

 themselves. Comparative physiology, too, would suggest 

 that diastases are to be classed among the enzymes common 

 to the general tisues and found in all forms of life from 

 the lowest to the highest. 78 For this reason especially the 

 author has never had any sympathy with ideas referring 

 the production of the diastase of the blood and other tissues 

 solely to one or more definite organs, as the pancreas and 

 salivary glands. Yet it does not in itself seem implausible 

 that diastase may be resorbed into the circulation from the 

 pancreas and eventually pass into the urine ; but statistics 

 as to the quantity of diastase in the blood of the pancreatic 

 veins are in general contradictory to this idea. However, 

 extirpation of the pancreas seems sometimes to diminish, 

 for a time at least, the amount of diastase in the blood ; while 

 conversely, after ligation of the pancreatic duct, the ferment 

 dammed up in the gland may pass in decidedly increased 

 amount into the blood and thence into the urine. For this 

 reason examination of the urine for its diastase has been 

 recommended as a diagnostic test of the function of the pan- 

 creas. 79 Recent observations from Carlson's laboratory 



"a J. Wohlgemuth and M. Strich, Sitzungsber. d. preuss. Arcad., 1910, 520. 



78 Cf. Literature in 0. v. Fiirth, Vergl. chern. Physiol. d. niederen Tiere, 

 Jena, 1903. 



79 W. S'chlesinger, Deutsch. med. Wochenschr., 1908, 593; A. J. Carlson 

 and A. B. Luckhardt (Chicago), Amer. Jour, of Physiol., 23, 148, 1908; 

 J. Wohlgemuth and collaborators, Biochem. Zeitschr., 21, 381, 422, 432, 447, 460, 

 1909; K. Mockel and F. Rost, Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 67, 433, 1910; J. J. R. 

 Macleod and R. G. Pearce (Cleveland), Amer. Jour, of Physiol., 25, 255, 1910; 

 G. Hirata, Biochem. Zeitschr., 27, 23, 1910; E. Marino (M. Jacoby's Lab.), 

 Deutsch. Arch. f. klin. Med., 103, 325, 1911; J. v. Benczur, Wiener klin. 

 Wochenschr., 23, 890, 1910. 



