Diseases of the intestines and peritoneum / by Hermann Nothnagel ; edited, with additions by Humphrey D. Rolleston ; authorized translation from the German, under the editorial supervision of Alfred Stengel.
- Hermann Nothnagel
- Date:
- 1904
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Diseases of the intestines and peritoneum / by Hermann Nothnagel ; edited, with additions by Humphrey D. Rolleston ; authorized translation from the German, under the editorial supervision of Alfred Stengel. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.
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![(Ewald, Scbmidt-Miiblheim) have never fouud a preci])itate of this character in the small intestine of an animal killed during digestion. The hydrochloric acid is partially or completely neutralized as soon as the chyme enters the intestine. In this way all peptic digestion is inhibited. As a matter of fact, if we are justified in concluding that the precipitate is formed, pepsin will be precipitated with the sediment, for finely divided sediments seem to have a tendency to precipitate the ferments. Boas denies that pepsin is precipitated in this way. The reac- tion of the intestinal contents furnishes a sure guide as to the mode of action of tlie pancreatic and intestinal juices. Simon and Zerner found that of the contents of the small intestine from recently dead corpses that from the duodenum and upper jejunum always showed an alkaline reaction to litmus, and that from the lower jejunum and ileum an acid reaction. The acid intestinal juice exerted a digestive action on fibrin only after it had been rendered alkaline by sodium carbonate. On the other hand, the intestinal contents which had been thus alkalinized lost their previously strong diastatic property. In the normal contents of the upper portion of the intestine, which are usually alkaline in reaction, the action was reversed. Fibrin was digested in a few hours, but starch was saccharified only after complete neutralization of the intestinal con- tents. The same condition of action was observed in the intestinal fluid obtained by a jejunal fistula. These observations as to the action of the pancreatic secretion of animals apply to man as well. Bile does not interfere with the proteolytic power of pancreatic juice, as w^as shown many years ago by Claude Bernard. As a matter of fact, albumin is rapidly digested by the intestinal contents of an animal killed during digestion, even though a considerable quantity of bile is present. Boas found that the same applies to the secretion of the small intestine in man. The fluid he obtained was a ^nixture of bile, pan- creatic juice, and succus entericus, and had an alkalinity corresponding to 0.8 pro mille of sodium bicarbonate. Digestion experiments showed that at a temperature of 40° 0. it dissolved 81 per cent, of the serum- albumin mixed with it within three hours. In another experiment in which he determined the amylolytic powers of this fluid the alkalinity was equal to 0.2 pro mille of sodium bicarbonate, and 25 per cent, of the starch was converted into maltose within three hours. Lastly, 12.1 per cent, of fatty acids was formed from a given quantity of neutral olive oil in three hours. The lipolytic power of the pancreatic juice, as we have already seen, is augmented by the bile ; this, as Martin and Williams have shown, 'also applies to its amylolytic power. The effect of trypsin on rennet has also been studied, and it has been shown that a neutral solution of the former destroys rennet within a short time, even at room-tempera- ture (A. Baginsky). Trypsin has no effect on pepsin; on the other hand, trypsin is destroyed by pepsin in acid, solution (Kiihne, Ewald, Mays, Langlay, Baginsky). The chyme, in addition to being changed by the digestive action of the pancreatic juice, supplemented and augmented, as we have seen, by](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21170010_0036.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
