The antidiabetic functions of the pancreas and the successful isolation of the antidiabetic hormone - insulin / by J.J.R. Macleod and F.G. Banting.

  • Macleod, J. J. R. (John James Rickard), 1876-1935
Date:
1923 [©1924]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The antidiabetic functions of the pancreas and the successful isolation of the antidiabetic hormone - insulin / by J.J.R. Macleod and F.G. Banting. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    13/86 (page 9)
    ing the comparative physiology of the digestion of herb¬ ivorous and carnivorous animals, and he noted, on ex¬ amination of the intestine and its mesentery after the animal had been given a meal of fat, that there was a striking difference between herbivorous animals, such as the rabbit, and carnivorous animals, such as the dog. In the former he noted that the lymphatics do not be¬ come white from absorbed fat for some considerable distance below the pylorus, whereas in the latter the whiteness starts much higher up. The significance of this observation might have escaped most minds. To Claude Bernard it was a clue to further investigation and he soon found that the cause for the difference de¬ pends on the fact that the pancreatic duct in the rabbit enters very low down compared with the position at which it enters in the dog. That led him to investigate the function of the pancreatic juice in connection with the digestion of fat and it was not long before he demon¬ strated its emulsifying and saponifying powers, and then, with the assistance of his friend, Barreswil, the chemist, he soon after discovered its effect on carbo¬ hydrates and proteins. These researches of Claude Bernard on the function of the pancreatic juice were very thorough and comparatively little has since been added to what he discovered. Some details of the method by which protein breaks down have indeed been learned, but we know little more of the effects produced on fats and carbohydrates. Claude Bernard in this as in most of his work cleared up the particular field in which he was working very thoroughly so that he did not apparently leave to others much that was funda¬ mental to discover. But it is not my intention to dis¬ cuss in these lectures the digestive functions of the pan¬ creas but rather the functions of that gland by which it prevents diabetes.