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TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION I. 



Section I. — Physiology. 

 President of the Section: Professor D. Noel Paton, M.D., P.E.S. 



TUESDAY, SEPT EM BEE 9. 

 The President delivered the following Address : — 



An Aspect of Protein Metabolism. 



Contents. 



I. Introduction 



II. Protein Metabolism ..... 



1. Proteins as a Source of Energy 



2. Proteins in Growth and Repair 



3. Specific Action of Constituents of Proteins 



i. Sources ..... 



ii. Methyl-guanidin a normal constituent of 



iii. Physiological Action of Guamdin ■ 



iv. Detoxication of Gnanidin 

 Significance of Urinary Creatin . 

 Creatin and Total Nitrogen in Muscle . 

 Creatin as an Anabolite .... 

 The Relationship of Creatin and Creatinin . 

 Creatin Investigations Old and Neiv 



III. Conclusion ...... 



tJie body 



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I. Intkoduction. 



Perhaps at this, our first meeting after the Great War, I might be expected 

 to speak of the part which Physiology played, not only in the alleviation of 

 suffering among the combatants, but also in guiding the policy of the Govern- 

 ment as regards the regulation of the supply of food for the civilian population 

 in those dark days when the submarine menaced our very existence. 



But so much has already been said upon these matters, and the claims of 

 Physiology have been so amply established, that I have decided to refrain 

 from elaborating them further, and rather to allow myself to forget these past 

 horrors and to ask your consideration of one of these problems of physiology, 

 which is not at present of any apparent practical importance. 



I do so the more willingly because I think that at the present time the 

 utilitarian aspect of science is being allowed to take too predominant a posi- 

 tion. We are perhaps just now apt to forget that our prime function is the 

 pursuit of knowledge for its own sake. On this all real progress depends. 



