SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 73 
THE METABOLISM OF THE NEURONE; A RESUME. 
_ By Louisa Burns, B.8., D. O. 
(Read before Section of Biology, April 10, 1905.) 
In all physiology there is no problem of more fascinating 
intricacy than this. The very difficulties which hedge about 
its solution are no small factors in the attraction it has exerted 
over the minds of investigators. Up to the present time, how- 
ever, all the light which research has thrown upon the problem 
has served chiefly to reveal new complexities. At the present 
condition of our knowledge of biology we should scarcely 
anticipate any other result. It is the purpose of this paper to 
bring together some of the results of recent researches in 
this line of investigation. 
The metabolism of the simplest cell is not yet unveiled. We 
are just beginning to realize certain laws of cause and effect, 
and of the conservation of energy in life processes, and, while 
so far we are unable to express vital phenomena in the terms 
of physics or of chemistry, yet we are persuaded that only the 
imperfection of our own powers of observation and correlation 
prevent such expressions. This ability to describe in detail 
the life events of the humbler cells, were it granted, would 
be of inestimable value in the elucidation of the metabolism 
of the extremely complex and highly differentiated cells cailed 
neurones. 
Since electricity, light, sound, heat and the grosser vibra- 
tions are able to bring about the decomposition of comparative- 
ly simple inorganic molecules, it is, perhaps, quite easily con- 
eeivable that the far more unstable molecules of the olfactory 
cells should be re-arranged by the attenuated emanations from 
the fraction of the millionth part of a grain of musk; that the 
tone of a bell miles away should initiate a nerve impulse in 
the auditory neurones of the same key and none other; that 
rays of light which have been traveling through space since 
the pyramids were young should cause the disintegration of 
the tigroid masses in the retine of our own eyes. These things 
are not altogether inexplicable in the face of our knowledge 
of the inorganic world. 
If ever we become able to picture the molecule of lying 
protoplasm, the concept will be that of a molecule made up 
of nascent radicals, combining and dissociating with dizzying 
rapidity and with the evolution of kaleidoscopic varieties of 
compounds. If we imagine the simplest metabolism as such 
as this, the phenomena of memory indicate that we must con- 
ceive of the substance of nerve cells as undergoing such con- 
tinuous changes, yet never becoming distorted, for years re- 
