ACID INTOXICATION 555 



200 mg. per 100 c.c, or over 1 per cent, of amino acids. The urea con- 

 tent is usually below 50 mg. The lipin content of the blood is also 

 greatly increased, ^^ with cholesteroleniia but a decrease in phospho- 

 lipins, the total ether extract being as high as 1.9 per cent. Sugar is 

 at first increased and later decreased; acetone bodies are but slightly 

 increased. 



Originof the Ami no=acids.—The earliest conception of the source 

 of the leucine and tyrosine found in the urine was that it came from 

 the products of tryptic digestion a})sorbcd from the intestinal tract, 

 which the liver could not convert into urea because of its damaged 

 condition. On the demonstration by Jacoby^^ that these same bodies 

 were present in the livers of phosphorus-poisoned animals because of 

 autolysis, it became probable that the leucine and tyrosine found in 

 the urine were formed from the degenerated liver-cells rather than in 

 the intestine, which view has become generally accepted. It seems 

 most probable, however, that the urinary amino-acids are derived 

 partly (and perhaps chiefly) from the autolysis of the liver, and 

 partly from amino-acids produced both in the intestine and within 

 the body during tissue metabolism, and which the liver cannot trans- 

 form into urea as it normally does, for several observers have reported 

 that even relatively slight disturbances in hepatic function are accom- 

 panied by a considerable rise in the amino-acids in the urine. ^^ 



ACID INTOXICATION AND ACETONURIA" 

 If a rabbit is given in repeated small doses by mouth considerable 

 quantities of inorganic acids, such as hydrochloric or phosphoric acids, 

 which it cannot destroy by oxidation, it soon becomes extremely ill. 

 The manifestations are characteristic — unsteadiness of motion and 

 stupor being followed by coma, in which the striking feature is the 

 excessively active respiration, as if the animal were being asphyxiated 

 (the so-called "air hunger"), while at the same time there is no cyanosis 

 and the blood is bright red, containing much less CO2 than normal, 

 while the amount of oxygen remains quite normal. The current 

 explanation of this interesting condition is as follows: Normally the 

 blood carries the CO2 away from the tissues to the lungs in combina- 

 tion with the inorganic alkalies of the blood, of which sodium is by far 

 the most abundant. This combination is the bicarbonate of sodium 

 (or other base), which in the lungs is decomposed into the carbonate, 

 the CO2 escaping into the alveolar air, according to this equation: 

 2NaHC03 ?=i NaoCOs + H2O -|- CO2 



" IMd., 1918 (86), 1. 



52 Zeit. phvsiol. Chem., 1900 (30), 174. 



" See Masuda, Zeit. exp. Path., 1911 (8), 629; Labb6 and Bith, Compt. Rend. 

 Soc. Biol., 1912 (73), 210. 



" General lituraturp to 1908, given by Ewing, Arch. Int. Med., 1908 (2), 330; 

 also see Magnus-Levy, Ergebnisse inn. Med., 1908 (1), 374; Lusk, Arch. Int. 

 Med., 1909 (3), 1. More recent literature given by Hurtley, (Juart. Jour. Med., 

 1916 (9), 301, and see also monograph by Sellards, "Principles of Acidosis,' 

 Harvard Univ. Press, 1917; Whitnev, Bost. Med. Surg. Jour., 1917 (176), 225. 



