150 Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 



ON THE RAPIDITY OF THE ABSORPTION OP CARBONIC OXIDE BY 

 THE LUNGS. BY M. N. GREHANT. 



In the researches which I made in 1864 on the renewal of air in 

 the lungs of man, I proved that in a man the volume of whose 

 lungs is equal to 293 litres after an inspiration, and to half a litre of 

 air after an expiration, 100 cub. centims. of gaseous mixture, taken 

 at any point of the air-vessels, have received 11 cub. centims. of 

 pure air. 



From this measurement, obtained by experiment, I drew this con- 

 clusion — that if a man be placed in an atmosphere containing 

 poisonous gas, from the first inspiration this gas is distributed 

 throughout all the air-vessels, to be given up to absorption by the 

 blood. 



To establish more completely this consequence, and to study the 

 successive phases of poisoning by the medium of the lungs, I made 

 several experiments in the physiological laboratory at the Museum 

 of Natural History, under the direction of my illustrious teacher, M. 

 Claude Bernard. As a poisonous gas I used carbonic oxide; and I 

 chose this gas for several reasons. M. Claude Bernard was the 

 first to make out that carbonic oxide kills animals because it fixes 

 itself on the red blood-globules and displaces the oxygen combined 

 with these globules, that in an animal which succumbs to poisoning 

 by carbonic oxide the arterial blood contains much less oxygen than 

 the normal arterial blood and the globules are combined with a 

 large proportion of carbonic oxide. 



We know that the crystalline combination of carbonic oxide with 

 hsemoglobine has been investigated and isolated by M. Hoppe- 

 Seyler, and that the spectroscope supplies a qualitative test for this 

 combination of oxygen with hsemoglobine. 



But in the research which I have undertaken I had another 

 object. I proposed to determine quantitatively the proportion of 

 carbonic oxide combined with the red globules at the different periods 

 of poisoning : this is why I have employed, in order to extract the 

 carbonic oxide from blood, the following method, which offers every 

 certitude. 



After having extracted the gases from some normal blood in a 

 vacuum at 40°, by means of a mercury pump, a volume of sulphuric 

 acid double that of the blood was introduced into the extraction-appa- 

 ratus, the bath was heated to 100°, and boiling was maintained for 

 half an hour; under these conditions we still obtained carbonic acid, 

 a trace of oxygen, and a little nitrogen, but no trace of carbonic 

 oxide. But if the blood of an animal poisoned with carbonic oxide 

 is operated on in the same manner, the vacuum alone at 40° gives 

 carbonic acid, oxygen, and nitrogen, but no trace of carbonic oxide; 

 whilst sulphuric acid at 100° in the vacuum destroys the globules, 

 and completely drives away the carbonic oxide combined with the 

 hsemoglobine. 



To verify the correctness of this method, I caused blood to absorb a 



