4 Thomson, Somatosc 



These figures do not add anything to our knowledge as to its 

 food value. 



The question then arose as to how it was possible to determine 

 whether it possessed any, and if so, what food value, and I con- 

 cluded that the only way was to feed animals with it as part of their 

 food, and weigh them from time to time, to find whether they 

 gained weight as compared with other animals eating the same 

 kind of food to which an amount of lean beef had been added, 

 equivalent in Nitrogen content to the Somatose. As I had only 

 a small quantity of Somatose at my disposal I could only afford to 

 feed small animals with it, and I decided to use tame mice. 



It required a series of trials to find the best method of feeding 

 them. If the food were left in an open dish the mice scattered it and 

 some was wasted. I finally put the food at the bottom of a small 

 wide mouthed bottle which was laid on its side, so that the mice had 

 to put their heads inside the bottle to get it ; this prevented 

 the scattering, and the food was then reduced in quantity to that 

 which an average mouse would eat in 24 hours. 



The food supplied to each consisted of 2 grammes of Oats per 24 

 hours, the other constituents of the food being altered in accord- 

 ance with their nature. It was desired in the first instance to find, 

 as was stated, whether Somatose as measured by its Nitrogen 

 content, was equal as a food to lean beef as measured by 

 its Nitrogen content. 



The following are the proportions of Nitrogen contained in 

 materials I employed for feeding purposes : — 



Per cent, of 

 Nitrogen 



Oats 2.22 



Lean Beef.. ... ... ... ... ■■• ••• 3.15 



Plasmon •• 11.16 



Somatose... ... ... ... ... ... ••• 13.13 



Lean beef contains about 68 per cent, of water, whilst Somatose 

 contains 13.26 per cent. 



By my analysis I found that 2 grammes of lean beef contained 

 0.063 gramme of Nitrogen, whilst the same amount of Nitrogen 

 was contained in 0.416 gramme of dry Somatose. The 2 grammes 

 of raw meat contained 1.36 grammes of water, which left a total of 

 solid matter in the 2 grammes of raw beef of 0.64 gramme: the 

 dry Somatose containing 0.063 gramme of Nitrogen amounted to 

 0.416 gramme, I therefore made up the deficiency in total solid 

 matter between the lean beef and the Somatose by adding 0.224 

 grammes of Dry Glucose to the Somatose ration. 



