296 INTERNAL SECRETION 



renal of dogs exhausted by muscular exertion, and a progressive 

 increase during recovery from such exhaustion. Battelli explains 

 these findings by, in the first instance, an abnormal expenditure 

 of the finished adrenalin ; and in the second, by the deposition 

 and accumulation of fresh precursors. He supposed that these 

 precursors, which he terms proto-adrenalin, represented the 

 material for the progressive increased production of adrenalin 

 during repose. Schur and Wiesel demonstrated the increased 

 adrenalin contents of the blood during muscular exertion by 

 means of Ehrmann's pupil reaction, and the diminution in active 

 substance present in the suprarenal by the weak chromium re- 

 action. These findings of Schur and Wiesel 's were, however, 

 not confirmed by Kahn's very exact experiments. 



Abelous, Soulie and Toujan investigated the formation of 

 adrenalin in the suprarenal by means of a series of experiments, 

 and the results at which they arrived are very remarkable. It 

 must be assumed that these authors employed, as a quantitative 

 adrenalin test, the colorimetric method with iodine which they 

 themselves formulated. They first showed that there was an 

 increase in the adrenalin contents of pounded suprarenal, if the 

 latter was kept for twenty-four hours at a temperature of 40. 

 In their view, however, this post-mortem formation of adrenalin 

 takes place principally in the cortical substance. For they found 

 that, after twenty-four hours in an incubator, the adrenalin con- 

 tents of the pounded cortex were 33 to 66 per cent, higher than 

 those of the control specimen kept at o. These results led them 

 to the conclusion, that adrenalin is formed in the cortex and is only 

 stored up in the medulla. In a further series of experiments, they 

 next showed that the addition to pounded suprarenal of a small 

 quantity of tryptophan, obtained by auto-digestion of the -pan- 

 creas, was followed by a considerable increase in the adrenalin 

 contents ; and they think it probable that tryptophan is one of 

 the matrices of adrenalin. They found, however, that the addi- 

 tion of pure tryptophan did not produce anything like the same 

 effect as the fluid product of pancreatic auto-digestion. They 

 tried, therefore, the effect of autolysates or extracts of putrefying 

 organs, and found that here also there was an increase in the 

 adrenalin contents of the pounded suprarenal ; from this they 

 conclude that adrenalin is formed post mortem in the cells of 

 the suprarenal. The fact that putrid substances from the muscles 

 produce a very large increase (the double and over) in the 

 adrenalin contents, appears to them a proof of the relationship 

 between the formation of adrenalin and the chemical processes of 

 the muscles. 



Toujan next carried out experiments supplementary to these ; 

 he summed up the results in a definite statement, that the supra- 

 renal cortex contains a precursor of adrenalin, and that adrenalin 

 is formed from it. 



