410 FORMATION OF FAT FROM PROTEIN 



pressed by the very appropriate term "fat phanerosis. ' ' A 

 large number of careful investigations, especially those (con- 

 ducted under direction of F. Hofmeister) of F. Kraus 2S 

 and of F. Siegert, 29 as well as those of G-. Rosenfeld, 30 and 

 A. Slosse 31 and a number from the Medical-chemical Insti- 

 tute in Tokio, 32 have shown that the formation de novo of 

 the higher fatty acids is impossible in autolysis without bac- 

 terial contamination. A few statements adverse 33 to this 

 view, in the author's opinion, prove absolutely nothing, as 

 the technique involved is by no means above objection. It is 

 especially unfair to account, for such purpose, on!y the bare 

 ethereal extract as fat; the tissues must be completely 

 broken down by an intense saponifying process (as in the 

 methods of Liebermann and of Kumagawa and Suto) 34 and 

 their higher fatty acids, poorly soluble in water, estimated 

 as fat as well. There is not the least contribution to the 

 solution of the situation in the attitude of Waldvogel, who 

 instead of simplifying the problem by reverting to the iso- 

 lated higher fatty acids introduced into the question 

 "hepatic protagon" and "jecorin" (more than problematic 

 in its chemical individuality), and tried to make the latter 

 an intermediate product between protein and fat, for which 

 assumption there was not even the shadow of proof. 



From the fact that in prevailing opinions, as will be dis- 

 cussed later, we are, in the production of a fatty liver from 



88 F. Kraus (F. Hofmeister's Lab., Prague), Arch. f. exper. Pathol., 22, 

 174, 1897. 



W F. Siegert (F. Hofmeister's Lab., Strassburg), Hofmeister's Beitrage, 1, 

 114, 1902. 



80 G. Rosenfeld, Ergebn. d. Physiol., 2, 90, 1903. 



81 A. Slosse (Brussels), Arch, internat. de Physiol., 1, 384, cited in Biochem. 

 Centralbl., 5, No. 711, 1904. 



32 Kohshi Ota, Biochem. Zeitschr., 29, 1, 1910; N. Shibata, ibid., 31, 321, 

 1911. 



M Kotsowski, Waldvogel, Leathes; cf. the criticism of J. Meinertz (Thier- 

 f elder's Lab.), Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 44, 371, 1905. 



"In reference to the Literature upon the more modern Methods of Fat 

 Analysis: Cf. the articles by Rohmann, Rosenfeld, and by Kumagawa and 

 Suto, in Abderhalden's Handb. d. biochem. Arbeitsmethoden, 5', 477-488, 1911. 



