524 
Adrenalin. 
f  Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
I  November.  1901. 
knowledge  has  been  contributed  over  Vulpian's  original  observa- 
tion that  ferric  chloride  and  iodine  impart  characteristic  hues  to  the 
glandular  juice. 
J.  J.  Abel's  investigation  on  the  subject  has  no  doubt  thrown 
some  light  on  the  chemical  side  ;  unfortunately  for  him,  however,  he 
was  not  working  with  the  active  principle  but  a  somewhat  modified 
substance,  or  the  benzoyl-compound  which  withstood  his  autoclave 
treatment. 
Otto  von  Furth,  of  Germany,  worked  on  the  same  line  of  research 
and  has  already  written  several  papers  in  which  a  controversy 
against  Abel's  epinephrin  was  entertained.  Epinephrin  is  a  substance 
in  suprarenal  glands  isolated  by  Dr.  Abel  and  claimed  by  him  to  be 
the  active  principle. 
It  is  von  Furth  who  declared  that  epinephrin  is  not  the  active 
principle  of  the  gland  but  an  inert  substance  mixed  with  diversified 
proportion  of  his  suprarenin,  which  he  claims  to  be  the  real  principle, 
according  to  conditions  of  preparation,  hence  its  variegation  of 
physiological  activity.  Epinephrin  may  be  made  entirely  inactive 
by  simply  refining  it.  This  was  also  observed  by  Abel  who  ascribed 
its  modification  to  the  nature  of  the  substance  and  concluded  that 
there  are  at  least  two  isomers  of  epinephrin,  namely,  active  and 
inactive. 
Suprarenin,  according  to  its  author,  is  obtained  from  the  filtrate 
in  which  Abel  considered  no  epinephrin  does  exist.  The  wide  dif- 
ference in  the  process  of  preparation  and  almost  entire  dissimilarity 
of  chemical  reaction  of  the  suprarenin  and  epinephrin  tends  to  put 
outsiders  in  obscurity  in  determining  whether  or  not  there  are  two 
ingredients  in  suprarenal  glands,  exerting  similar  physiological 
activity. 
Abel,  however,  recently  published  a  further  observation  on  epin- 
ephrin, in  March  number  of  the  Johns  Hopkins  Hospital  Bulletin, 
1 90 1,  in  which  he  substantiated  von  Furth's  statement  that  the  un- 
altered or  rather  native  active  principle  of  the  gland  is  not  at  all 
precipitable  by  ammonia  and  naturally  he  recognized  that  epin- 
ephrin was  indeed  a  modified  substance  of  the  active  principle  as 
Furth  argued,  thus  having  partly  concluded  the  dispute  between  the 
two  authors.  Still,  however,  there  remains  a  question  whether 
suprarenin  be  the  pure  active  ingredient  or  a  mixture  thereof,  with 
more  or  less  inert  matters,  as  long  as  von  Furth  cannot  get  it  in 
pure,  stable,  definite  forms. 
