CHAPTEE XIII 



RELATIONS OF GLANDS WITH INTERNAL SECRE- 

 TION TO CARBOHYDRATE METABOLISM. 

 GLYCURONIC ACIDS 



RELATION OF THE ADRENALS TO CARBOHYDRATE 

 METABOLISM 



IN the course of a series of earlier lectures the writer 

 attempted to present what is known of the role and the 

 significance of "the glands with internal secretion, " at least 

 as far as the principal points are concerned. An important 

 phase of this physiological problem has not, however, been 

 systematically dealt with, the relations these puzzling organs 

 bear to carbohydrate metabolism. In the present lecture it 

 is proposed to fill in this hiatus and to consider the matter 

 in an objective manner, so that it may be possible to come 

 to some conclusion to what extent we are justified in the 

 effort so often made in the course of the last few years to 

 penetrate into the secrets of normal and pathological car- 

 bohydrate metabolism and to interweave these with the no 

 less secret and obscure mysteries of the "ductless glands'' 

 into one organic whole. 



Nature of Adrenal Diabetes. The line of thought which is 

 principally to occupy our attention in the present discussion, 

 takes its inception from the discovery of adrenal diabetes. 1 



In 1901 F. Blum, in Frankfurt, a. M., made the remark- 

 able and important discovery that injection of the substance 

 in the adrenals which induces increase of blood pressure 

 (known in the present stage of science by the term supra- 

 renin or adrenin) is followed by an intense glycosuria of 

 short duration in various experiment animals. The very 

 great interest always manifested in the problem of diabetes 



1 Literature upon Adrenal Diabetes: A. Biedl, Innere Secretion, pp. 202- 

 204, 1910; R. Hirsch, Handb. d. Biochem., 3, 322-325, 1910; G. Bayer, Ergebn. 

 d. pathol. Anat., U, 101-105, 117-119, 1910. 

 300 



