CERTAIN DERIVATIVES OF THE PROTEIDS. 309 



which he termed hemialbumin, and which by continued hydroly- 

 sis gave rise to peptone and amido-acids. These conclusions 

 were verified in part, and extended by Kuhne in his study of 

 the action of the proteolytic enzymes upon these two bodies, 

 i. e., hemiprotein and hemialbumin. The former was found to 

 be slowly digestible by pepsin-hydrochloric acid, while by 

 alkaline pancreatic juice it was eventually transformed hi great 

 part into a peptone without any trace of amido-acids being 

 formed.* In other words, the substance was remarkably 

 resistant to that secondary action of the pancreatic enzyme by 

 which pancreatic proteolysis is especially characterized. On 

 this account Kuhne suggested the name of antialbumid as 

 more expressive of the general nature of the substance than 

 the term hemiprotein, and by this name the substance has 

 generally been known for the past twenty years. The so- 

 called hemialbumin of Schiitzenberger was found by Kuhne to 

 be readily digestible in artificial gastric juice, giving rise to 

 peptone, while, by the action of pancreatic juice, leucin and 

 tyrosin were formed in abundance. To the hemialbumin of 

 Schiitzenberger, Kuhne gave the name of hemialbumose, 

 which prevailed for a time until it was found that this sub- 

 stance was in reality a mixture of several related substances, 

 to which the name of albumoses was applied.! Through 

 these researches, followed by many others that need not be 

 enumerated here, the view that in the native proteid molecule 

 there are present two distinct atomic complexes has gradually 

 gained credence, and as a result the prefixes hemi and anti 

 have been, and are, widely used to designate inner differences 

 in the various hydrolytic cleavage products of the proteids, 

 whether formed by the action of boiling dilute acids or by 

 the action of proteolytic enzymes. A hemi body has thus 

 come to mean a substance which under the influence of trypsin 

 will break down into crystalline amido-acids and other simple 

 products, while an anti body fails to yield any such simple 

 products under the action of trypsin. The researches of 



* Kuhne and Chittenden, loc. cit. 



t Kuhne and Chittenden, Zeitschr. f. Biologic, 1884, xx, p. 11. 



