218 



Messrs. F. P. Knowlton and E. H. Starling. [Mar. 26, 



elsewhere, has been defrayed in part by grants from the Eoyal Society and 

 from the British Association. 



REFERENCES TO LITERATURE CITED. 



1910. H. E. and E. F. Armstrong, ' Roy. Soc. Proc.,' 1910, B, vol. 82, p. 588. 



1911. H. E. and E. F. Armstrong, ' Annals of Botany,' 1911, vol. 25, p. 507. 



Clarke, Ernest D., " The Nature and Function of the Plant Oxydases," ' Torreya,' 



vol. 11, 3, p. 31 ; vol. 11, 4, p. 84 ; vol. 11, 5, p. 101. 

 Gortner, Ross A, " Studies in Melanin. III.— The Inhibitory Action of certain 



Phenolic Substances on Tyrosinase — a Suggestion as to the Cause of Dominant 



and Recessive "Whites," 'Journal of Biological Chemistry,' 1911, vol. 10, 2, 



p. 113. 



Wheldale, M., "On the Formation of Anthocyan," 'Journal of Genetics,' 1911, 

 vol. 1, No. 2, p. 133. 



On the Nature of Pancreatic Diabetes. [Preliminary Com- 

 munication.) 

 By F. P. Knowlton and E. H. Starling, F.RS. 



(Received March 26,— Eead March 28, 1912.) 

 (From the Institute of Physiology, University College, London.) 



Many explanations have been proposed for the fact, discovered by von 

 Mering and Minkowski (1), that extirpation of the pancreas is followed 

 immediately by severe and fatal diabetes. It has been suggested on the one 

 hand that the normal function of the pancreas is to diminish excessive 

 production of sugar, and that, in the absence of its restraining influence, 

 excessive sugar production and mobilisation are the results. On the other 

 hand, the fact that carbohydrates are not utilised by the body when 

 administered to animals in this condition has been interpreted as showing 

 that the tissues have lost their normal power of assimilating and utilising 

 glucose. It has also been suggested, though without much experimental 

 support, that the sugar of the blood has to be built up into some other form 

 before it can be utilised by the tissues. 



We have recently, in a research on the influence of mechanical conditions 

 and of temperature on the heart beat, modified the procedure described by 

 Jerusalem and Starling (2) for working with a heart-lung preparation, so 

 that we are able to keep a heart, connected with the lungs but isolated from 

 the i rest of the body, beating for many hours in approximately normal 



