ACIDOSIS 343 



the acidosis resulting from starvation, from uremia, 

 from diabetes or from Bright 's disease ; and supplies 

 a reason why the use of intravenous infusions of sodium 

 bicarbonate sometimes overcomes the coma of diabetes 

 and uremia. It may explain the quick death from 

 chloroform, ether and nitrous oxid, and may, perhaps, 

 suggest why unconsciousness is so commonly the 

 immediate precursor of death. 



One of the most noticeable immediate effects of the 

 administration of an inhalation anesthetic is a marked 

 increase in the rapidity and amplitude of the respi- 

 ration. The respiratory center has evidently been 

 evolved to act with increased vigor proportional - 

 within certain limits to the increase in the H-ion 

 concentration, whereas the centers governing the 

 voluntary muscles are depressed with the increase in 

 H-ion concentration. In these antithetic reactions 

 of the higher cortical centers and the lower centers in 

 the medulla to acidity we find a remarkable instance of 

 adaptation, by which the animal is prevented from 

 killing itself through the further increase in acidity 

 which would result from continued excessive muscular 

 activity. In other words, as the acidity produced by 

 muscular activity increases and threatens life, the respira- 

 tory action, by which carbon dioxid is eliminated and 

 oxygen supplied, thus diminishing the acidity, is in- 

 creased, while the driving power of the brain, by which 

 acidity is produced, is lessened or inhibited, producing 

 unconsciousness. Without this life-saving regulation, 

 animals under stress would inevitably commit suicide. 

 Direct chemical evidence supports the postulate that 

 the cortical centers and the centers in the medulla 



