408 THE LIVER. 



acid is an intermediary step. Many 1 objections have been advanced 

 against the view of STOKLASA that in animal as well as in plant tissues, 

 in anaerobic respiration, an alcoholic fermentation may occur as this 

 observed action of the tissues could only be brought about by the presence 

 of micro-organisms. 



That lactic acid can be an intermediary step in the destruction of 

 sugar in the animal body cannot be denied. On the contrary it follows 

 from several circumstances which will be mentioned in Chapter 

 X. (muscle) on the origin of lactic acid that such a condition exists 

 and the following observations of A. R. MANDEL and LusK 2 on the 

 relation of lactic acid to diabetes indicate the same. These exper- 

 imenters showed after phosphorus poisoning in dogs, that the blood and 

 urine contained abundance of lactic acid, and on producing phlorhizin- 

 diabetes it disappeared from these fluids, and also that phosphorus poison- 

 ing does not cause a lactic acid formation in dogs with phlorhizin- 

 diabetes. Although it is difficult to give a satisfactory interpretation 

 of these observations, it is still very probable that in the elimination 

 of the sugar in phlorhizin-diabetes a mother-substance of the lactic acid 

 is lost. 



We do not agree as to the ways and means which bring about 

 the so-called glycolysis, and another disputed question is whether the 

 glycolysis can be produced by one organ or only by the combined action 

 of several organs. COHNHEIM 3 found that a cell-free fluid can be obtained 

 from a mixture of pancreas and muscle, which destroys glucose, while 

 the pancreas alone does not have this action, and the muscle only to a 

 slight extent. The pancreas does not contain, according to COHNHEIM, 

 a glycolytic enzyme, but a substance resistant to boiling temperatures, 

 which is soluble in water and alcohol, and which, like an amboceptor, 

 activates a glycolytic proenzyme which exists in the muscle fluid, but 

 which is inactive alone and which retards glycolysis when it exists in 

 excess. 



The statements of COHNHEIM have been disputed, and recently LEVENE 

 and MEYER 4 have shown that we are not here dealing with a disap- 

 pearance of glucose by glycolysis, but more likely with a disappearance 



1 See the works of O. Cohnheim, Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 39, 42, 43; Batelli, 

 Compt, rend., 137; Portier, Compt. rend. soc. biol., 57; Harden and Maclean, Journ. 

 of Physiol., '42 and 43. 



2 Amer. Journ. of Physiol., 16. 



3 Cohnheim, Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 39, 42, 43, and 47. 



4 Stocklasa and collaborators, Centralbl. f. Physiol., 17, and Ber. d. d. chem. 

 Gesellsch., 36 and 38; Feinschmidt, Hofmeister's Beitrage, 4; Hirsch, ibid.', Claus and 

 Embden, ibid., 6; Arnheim and Rosenbaum, Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 40; Braun- 

 stein, Zeitschr. f. klin. Med., 51; Levene and Meyer, Journ. of biol. Chem., 9. 



