CHAP. IV.] 



THE GASES OF THE BILE. 



343 



SECT. 14. THE 'GASES OF THE BILE. 



The gases of the bile have been investigated by Pfluger 1 , 

 Bogoljubow 2 , Noel 3 , Charles 4 and, in so far as oxygen is concerned, 

 by Hoppe-Seyler 5 . 



The bile is a secretion which is either entirely free from oxygen 

 or contains it in very small proportions. As will be seen by referring 

 to the subjoined tabular statement of the results obtained by 

 Pfluger, he found in one analysis that 100 volumes of bile yielded 

 0*2 volumes of oxygen (measured at C. and 1 M. pressure), whilst, 

 in a second, oxygen was absent. Hoppe-Seyler investigated in the 

 case of the bile, as in that of several other secretions, whether the 

 liquid contained free oxygen, by allowing it ' to come in contact 

 (under conditions which excluded the possibility of access of air) 

 with reduced haemoglobin. He found that, unlike the saliva, the 

 bile contained no free oxygen or, to be more precise, that 100 volumes 

 of bile must contain less than 0*15 volume of oxygen 6 . 



Excluding oxygen, which is either absent or present in very 

 small quantities, the bile, when boiled in the mercurial pump, yields 

 carbonic acid mixed with a small quantity of nitrogen. In aUdition 

 to the carbonic acid, which is either free or so loosely combined as 



VOLUME OF GASES (MEASUEED AT 0C. AND 1 M. PRESSURE) YIELDED 

 BY 100 VOLUMES OF BILE FEOM THE GALL-BLADDER OF DOGS 

 (PFLUGER). 



1 Pfliiger, Archivf. d. ges. Physiologie, Vol. n. (1869), p. 156. 



2 Bogoljubow, Centralblatt f. d. med. Wissenschaft, 1869, no. 42. 



3 G. Noel, ' Etude generate sur les variations phys. des gaz du sang.' These de 

 Paris, 1876. Quoted by Hoppe-Seyler, Phys. Chemie, p. 306. The researches of Noel 

 may be discarded as, from the amount of oxygen and especially of nitrogen which he 

 found, it is certain that the gases which he obtained from the bile were mixed with 

 large quantities of air which had leaked into his apparatus. 



4 J. J. Charles, ' Untersuchungen iiber die Gase der Lebergalle ' (a. d. phys. Lab. 

 Bonn). Pfliiger's Archiv, Vol. xxvi. (1881), p. 200 et seq. 



6 Hoppe-Seyler, ' Ueber den Nachweis von absorbirtem Sauerstoffe in den Secreten 

 mittelst Hamoglobin.' Zeitschrift f. phys. Chemie, Vol. i. (187778), p. 135. 

 8 Hoppe-Seyler, Physiologische Chemie, p. 307. 



