Abstract
LONDON. Royal Society, November II.—Sir Archibald Geikie, K.C.B., president, in the chair.—H. C. Ross: The vacuolation of the blood-platelets: an experimental proof of their cellular nature.—H. G. Plimmer and Captain W. B. Fry: Further results of the experimental treatment of trypanosomiasis, being a progress report to a committee of the Royal Society.—G. S. West and B. M. Griffiths: Hillhousia mirabilis, a giant sulphur bacterium.—Dr. H. B. Fantham and Miss Annie Porter: The modes of division of Spirochaeta recurrentis and S. duttoni as observed in the living organisms. The observations recorded were made on living Spirochætes. The examination of living material is imperative, as results based only on stained preparations are not always trustworthy. Both longitudinal and transverse division occur in Spirochaætes, as seen in S. recurrentis, S. duttoni, S. anodontae, and S. balbianii. There is a periodicity in the direction of division exhibited by S. recurrentis and S. duttoni. At the onset of infection longitudinal division occurs. This is followed by transverse division of the Spirochætes when the infection is at its height. As the infection draws to an end, and there is a diminution in numbers of the parasites, there is a reappearance of longitudinal division. Naturally there are times when both forms of division occur together. The observations relating to periodicity were made on peripheral blood of the host. The actual processes of division, and the movements of the parasites meanwhile, are set forth in detail in the paper.—G. A. Buckmaster and J. A. Gardner: The supposed presence of carbon monoxide in normal blood, and in the blood of animals anaesthetised with chloroform. In a paper published in 1898, Desgrez and Nicloux stated that the normal blood of Paris dogs contains about 1.6 c.c. of carbon monoxide per litre, and that when the animals are anaesthetised by chloroform the amount increases to 2.5 to 6 c.c., according to the duration of anæsthesia. Their method of estimating carbon monoxide consisted in passing the blood gases over iodine pentoxide at 150° C., and determining the iodine liberated by the method of Rabourdin. The authors have carefully re-investigated the question, making use of Haldane's method of estimating carbon monoxide by means of diluted blood, after having previously ascertained that far smaller quantities of this gas than those found by the French observers in normal blood gases could be readily detected. They find that neither normal cats' blood nor the blood of cats anaesthetised by chloroform contains any detectable trace of carbon monoxide. They also find that most of the chloroform in the blood comes off with the gases when extracted at 40deg; C. In order to arrive at an explanation of Nicloux's results, the authors (1) repeated his experiments with variations, investigated (2) the effect of heat on iodine pentoxide, (3) the effect of chloroform vapour on iodine pentoxide, and (4) the effect of chloroform vapour on alkalis. The latter experiments show that chloroform vapour is readily decomposed by passing over solid potash, and also by the reagents used in gas analysis, with the production of carbon monoxide. It is concluded from the experiments (1) that chloroform is not decomposed in the blood with formation of carbon monoxide; (2) the iodine liberated in the experiments of Nicloux was due, to some extent, to the direct decomposition of the iodine pentoxide by the chloroform vapour in his blood gases, but mainly to the carbon monoxide produced by the action of this chloroform on the solid potash over, which he passed the blood gases in order to free them from carbon dioxide.—G. W. Ellis and J. A. Gardner: The origin and destiny of cholesterol in the animal organisms. Part vi., the excretion of cholesterol by the cat. In this paper the results of a number of estimations of the cholesterol content of the fasces of cats fed on a variety of diets—animal and vegetable—of known cholesterol content, are described. It was found that cats behave similarly to dogs when fed on meat diets, but the tendency for the change of cholesterol into coprosterol appears to be greater in the case of cats. The change is, however, never complete unless the diet contains a considerable amount of fat. In all these experiments the total cholesterol and coprosterol excreted was considerably less than that taken in with the food. Without considering the cholesterol poured into the gut with the bile, the percentage deficit was 50—60, an average loss of about 0.08 gram per day. In the case of vegetable diets free from cholesterol or phytosterol, the weights of food necessary to keep the animals in condition were larger, and the amounts of faeces very much larger, than in the case of meat diets. Small amounts of cholesterol were excreted, averaging about 0.03 gram per day, but no change into coprosterol took place. In the case of artificial diets to which measured quantities of cholesterol or phytosterol were added, no excess of cholesterol above that administered was recovered from the faeces. The bearing of these results on hypotheses advanced in former papers of the series is discussed.—Prof. W. A. Osborne: The elasticity of rubber balloons and hollow viscera (with a note by W. Sutherland).
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Societies and Academies . Nature 82, 88–90 (1909). https://doi.org/10.1038/082088b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/082088b0