i2o Shiro Tashiro 



nerve for ten minutes, while a fresh resting nerve gave only 6.7 by 

 iQ- 7 grams for the same units. The details of the methods are as 

 follows: 



The nerve of the claw of the spider crab is isolated as before. A 

 comparative estimation was made first. Two pieces of the nerve of 

 equal . weights and length were placed separately on the two glass 

 plates, each nerve being laid across the electrodes of the plate, in the 

 manner shown in Figure i . In this way either nerve can be stimulated 

 at will. These glass plates are hung by their wires upon the platinum 

 wires fused into the side of the apparatus, these wires being con- 

 nected in turn with the induction coil. Under this condition, when 

 both nerves are not stimulated, the amounts of the precipitate are 

 equal in both chambers. However, when one of the nerves is elec- 







FIGURE. 1. Glass weighing plate. A. B. Platinum wire fused in the rear of 

 the glass plate, with hooks. C. The nerve which is stimulated at D. 

 G. The plate proper. 



I have the other piece of the same glass out of which this plate is made. This 

 piece of glass is weighed exactly equal to this weighing plate, so that any 

 wet tissue can be weighed very quickly. In order to make results more accu- 

 rate, no attempt was made to weigh closer than | milligram. 



trically stimulated (the distance between the primary and secondary 

 coils was always more than 10 cm. using a red dry battery, the current 

 being barely perceptible on the tongue), not only does the precipitate 

 appear sooner in the chamber in which the excited nerve is placed, 

 but also the quantity of the carbonate is much greater. 



To test whether the increase of CO 2 production from the stimu- 

 lated nerve is due to the direct decomposing influence of the current, 

 or to the increase of metabolism produced by the passage of a nerve 



long as we are not concerned with the electrical changes in the nerve, the use of 

 platinum electrodes instead, is not a great objection, provided that the current 

 is weak enough not to decompose the tissue directly, and that the duration of 

 stimulation is not very long. 



