96 



Scientific Proceedings (118). 



experiments they concluded that acetaldehyde acts similarly to 

 ether and nitrous oxide, by virtue of its hypnotic effects. 



We cannot accept Sansum and Woodyatt's application of their 

 results to acetaldehyde for a number of reasons. 



I. Because in the doses given, acetaldehyde has no hypnotic 

 effects, whereas the ether and nitrous oxide render the animals 

 unconscious. 



II. The giving of ethyl alcohol and a number of other sub- 

 stances to the point of complete hypnosis did not produce any 

 extra glucose elimination, proving that it is more than hypnosis 

 that is affecting the residual glycogen. 



III. In the third series of our experiments we found that 

 substances like glycocoll, alanin, lactic and propionic acids when 

 administered to adrenalinized dogs yield less than one half the 

 amount of glucose than they do ordinarily, and that a number of 

 glucogenetic substances would never have been detected if Sansum 

 and Woodyatt's technique were followed. 



Glycogen is the most mobile food stuff that the body possesses, 

 and if we find that after five and seven days of starvation and 

 complete diabetes the body cells still cling to this residual glycogen, 

 in spite of that tremendous demand for it, and still hold on to 

 about 150 mgs. per 100 grams of muscle, it must have a different 

 significance in the cell economy from the ordinary glycogen that 

 moves in and out of the cell. After an animal is deglycogenized 

 by means of adrenalin there must be established a state of 1 'gly- 

 cogen hunger." When a glucogenetic substance is given during 

 that period we can readily conceive of that glucose being retained 

 in part to supply that glycogen. This is how we would interpret 

 the failure of Sansum and Woodyatt to obtain extra glucose from 

 acetaldehyde. 



In a fourth series of experiments we rendered dogs glycogen 

 free as described by Sansum and Woodyatt and which method 

 we have proven in the second series of these experiments actually 

 does free the animals from glycogen. We then allowed the animals 

 to continue fasting and be diabetic by means of phlorhizin. The 

 animals were killed three days after the deglycogenization and the 

 muscles were found to contain the following amounts of glycogen, 

 0.020, 0.033, 0.023 and 0.039 gm. per 100 grams. In one animal 



