OXIDATIVE FUNCTION OF LIVER 385 



that these acids undergo oxidation very readily in the air 

 with loss of iodine-binding power and the further fact that 

 Rohmann 16 and his collaborators found the acetyl propor- 

 tions of the mixture of fatty acids obtained from the liver 

 extracts distinctly higher than those of the fat from adipose 

 tissue; the acetyl figure (the number of milligrams of 

 potassium hydrate which are combined with the amount of 

 acetic acid in one gram of acetylized fat after saponification 

 with alcoholic solution of potassium hydrate) is a well-known 

 measure for the amount of free hydroxyl groups in a fat. It 

 seems that unsaturated acids are to be found in tissues not 

 only in the form of lecithids and phosphatids but also in the 

 form of simple glycerides. 



Oxidative Function of the Liver in the Catabolism of 

 Higher Fatty Acids. These results acquire special signifi- 

 cance from the observations of G. Joannovics and E. P. Pick, 

 and, too, of Leathes and Hartley, indicating that the liver 

 upon access of fat with the food subjects it to an oxidation 

 catabolism with formation of high unsaturated acids. The 

 first mentioned investigators were able to reduce this oxida- 

 tion power in the living animal by narcotics. It might well 

 be imagined, perhaps, that by the introduction of new double 

 combinations into the long carbon chain the fatty acids would 

 be prepared for their oxidative destruction, these double 

 combinations forming points of lessened resistance at which 

 the chains may be separated into shorter fragments, the lat- 

 ter then in turn undergoing further disintegration. 17 The 

 essential features of the subject are not proven, however, as 

 yet. In this connection the passage of fat to the liver might 

 from one standpoint be interpreted on the supposition that 



16 F. Rohmann, with W. Lummert, Y. Nukada, Pfliiger's Arch., 71, 176, 

 1898; Biochem. Zeitschr., 14, 419, 1908. 



"G. Joannovics and E. P. Pick (Instit. Paltauf, Vienna), Wiener klin. 

 Wochenschr., 1910, 573; Pfliiger's Arch., 140, 327, 1911; J. B. Leathes, 1. c.; 

 J. B. Leathes and L. Meyer- Wedell, Journ. of Physiol., 38, Proc. Physiol Soc. 

 XXXVIII, 1909; P. Hartley (Lab. of J. B. Leathes), Jour, of Physiol., 38, 

 353, 1909; H. Mottram, Jour, of Physiol., 38, 281, 1909. 

 25 



