10 ANALYSIS OF DISTURBANCES OF METABOLISM 



With more justice, Voit's requirement of 118 grams of albumin has been 

 the subject of dispute. In the discussion regarding this amount there has 

 been much difference of opinion. In their conception of the main point in 

 dispute, the views of different authors were diametrically opposed; and the 

 conflicting opinions which arose in consequence of this have kept the discus- 

 sion alive to the present time. 



In the food of man, which consists of albumin, fat and carbohydrates, 

 the albumin bodies grouped in contrast to N-free substances are especially 

 important. While the latter may be compensated for to a great extent by 

 each other and also by albumin, according to the measure of their energy 

 value, a certain quantity of albumin- in the daily food is irreplaceable and 

 indispensable if the proteids of the body are to be maintained intact. 



To determine this indispensable amount of albumin, the minimum which 

 the body requires to maintain the living substance in a functioning condition 

 has been the subject of much discussion. 



For a time it was believed (Bidder and Schmidt) that this albumin mini- 

 mum corresponded with the albumin-metabolism of persons kept in a state 

 of starvation, i. e., that the nitrogen excretion in starvation furnishes a stand- 

 ard for the nitrogenous metabolism necessary to maintain life, that is, the 

 actual albumin requirement of the body. All the albumin absorbed from the 

 intestine in excess of this was to be considered " luxury," and was supposed, 

 like the N-f ree substances, to undergo prompt combustion, in the blood without 

 becoming organized at all. 



Among clinicians, no less a one than Frerichs upheld this theory of " lux- 

 ury combustion," propounded by C. G. Lehmann. 



Voit opposed the " luxury " theory. In his " Handbook of the Physiology 

 of Total Metabolism" (page 269) he devotes a special chapter to contradicting 

 this, and furnishes convincing proofs. 



According to experiments made in the dog, which of course are to be inter- 

 preted somewhat differently from human experiments and which in their 

 general application to man have been attacked by some investigators, the 

 smallest quantity of albumin which will maintain the nitrogenous equilibrium 

 of the body (on a mixed diet with K-free food substances) is usually 2^ to 3 

 times larger than the nitrogenous metabolism in starvation. In their com- 

 prehensive experiments E. Voit and Korkunoff ^ still found the minimum 

 albumin-requirement to be 111 per cent, greater than the nitrogenous metab- 

 olism in starvation (and even with very large amounts of starch in the food). 



It may therefore be considered as proved that if we give a dog only the 

 amount of proteid which is decomposed in a state of starvation, this amount 

 IS not sufficient to maintain the nitrogenous equilibrium of the body. 



In man the same appears to be true. With sufficient food, the excretion of 

 urea is mcreased decidedly above the starvation figures. From this experi- . 

 ence, and upon the basis of investigations on the nutrition of a large number 

 of workmen, Voit computed as a standard for any sufficient diet the above- 



i£. Voit and Korkunoff, "Die geringste zur Erhaltung des Stickstoffgleichgewichtes 

 nothige Menge von Eiweiss." Zeitschr. f. Biol, xxxii, p. 58. 



