52 SECTIONAL ADDRESSES. 



cesses. Nevertheless, the more complex substances which nature utilises 

 in building up her animal and vegetable structures still show no signs of 

 yielding the secrets of their constitutions, or the mechanism by which 

 they are produced. Indeed, although we can imitate in the laboratory 

 certain natural operations such as the hydrolysis of starch to glucose, 

 we are still quite ignorant of the means by which glucose is converted, by 

 the appropriate enzyme, into alcohol and carbon dioxide, neither can we 

 imitate this process in the laboratory. 



When once the chemist has passed beyond the crystalline and the 

 distillable he enters a region full of difficulties, because he has few means 

 either of purifying the materials with which he has to deal, or of deter- 

 mining their homogeneity when they have been purified. These are the 

 real difficulties which confront the biochemist when he approaches his 

 subject from the structural side of organic chemistry. Biochemistry is 

 in the unique position of being both a descriptive or observational science 

 and also one of the experimental sciences. From the biological side it has 

 at its disposal the wealth of knowledge acquired by the physiologists and 

 pathologists, and from the chemical side it is in touch with the recorded 

 experience of several generations of organic chemists. If biochemistry is 

 to justify its name it must carry out its function of bringing into line the 

 discoveries of the physiologists with organic chemical structure, for by 

 this means only will it be possible to gain an insight into the chemistry 

 of natural processes which it is the object of biochemistry to discover. 

 It is far from my object to disparage the wonderful work which has been 

 done and is being done bj' physiologists and pathologists in their attack 

 on the mechanism of normal and abnormal life processes. Their record 

 speaks for itself. But too little is being done to approach the problems 

 from the purely organic chemical side, and too few of the people engaged 

 in biochemical research have an adequate knowledge of organic chemistry 

 or the methods of the organic chemist. The number of organic chemists 

 who are co-operating with biologists in their attack on natural processes 

 is too few. Indeed, the very difficult question arises here as to how best 

 to organise methods for dealing with problems which are essential border- 

 land problems between two great sciences. I do not propose on this 

 occasion to discuss the vexed question of the chemical engineer, but actually 

 the analogy between this hybrid and the biochemist is fairly close. Is the 

 biochemist to be a biologist with a knowledge of chemistry, or is he to be 

 a chemist with a knowledge of biology ? I refer, of course, to the method 

 of training required for a man or woman who proposes to take up bio- 

 chemical research during the fourth year. Given twenty years and the 

 requisite capacity it is, of course, possible for a man to acquire sufficient 

 acquaintance with both sciences to render him an effective worker in the 

 borderland field, although here again the temperament which promotes 

 enthusiasm for research in the experimental sciences and that which 

 leads to initiative in the descriptive sciences is not usually found in the 

 same individual. As knowledge increases the need for specialisation must 

 also increase, because the time factor — that is, the time during which it 

 is possible for a student to undergo training — cannot be prolonged beyond 

 a certain period. Even at the present time it is an open question whether 

 it is possible to give a student a special training in more than one science 



