120 



Scientific Proceedings (112). 



in all but one case there was an increase in the carbohydrate metab- 

 olism as manifest by the high respiratory quotient and the 

 calculated amount of carbohydrate burned. The plethora of 

 carbohydrate in the blood stream might account for this stimu- 

 lation of carbohydrate metabolism. All the evidence seems to 

 point to the fact that the liver has a decreased ability to demobilize 

 carbohydrate from the blood stream — or perhaps there is a 

 hypermobilization rate. 



56 (1638) 



On a volatile sperm-stimulating substance derived from 

 marine eggs. 



By G. H. A. CLOWES and E. BACHMAN. 



[From the Research Laboratories of Eli Lilly and Company, Indian- 

 apolis, and the Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole.] 



Sea urchins eggs suspended in sea water secrete a sperm- 

 stimulating substance studied by Jacques Loeb and H. M. Fuchs, 

 as well as the sperm-agglutinating substance investigated by 

 Frank Lillie and O. Glaser. From preliminary experiments carried 

 out last season at Woods Hole, it appears that this sperm-stimu- 

 lating substance may be derived from the eggs of the sea urchin, 

 star fish and sand dollar; that it is non-specific and is a com- 

 paratively simple volatile, organo substance, a product of enzy- 

 matic action or fermentation within the cell. 



This substance, the exact constitution of which is not yet 

 known, may be distilled from a neutral, acid or alkaline extract, 

 the first distillate exerting an effect almost equal to that of the 

 original extract. It is not destroyed by heating in a sealed tube 

 in an autoclave for several hours, in a neutral or alkaline solution, 

 but is weakened by heating with acid. It is very rapidly de- 

 stroyed by iodine and other oxidizing agents, a brief exposure to 

 N/5000 or N/ 10000 iodine solution causing a lowering in its 

 stimulating activity of at least 100 to I. This substance, when 

 added to quiescent or attenuated sperm, greatly increases the 

 facility with which the eggs are fertilized by the sperm. 



A large number of simple volatile organo substances of the type 



