Observations on some of the colouring matters of the bile and urine, with especial reference to their origin : and on an easy method of procuring haematin from blood / by C.A. Mac Munn.

  • MacMunn, Charles Alexander, 1852-1911.
Date:
[1883]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on some of the colouring matters of the bile and urine, with especial reference to their origin : and on an easy method of procuring haematin from blood / by C.A. Mac Munn. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    10/24 (page 28)
    Now I formerly found haomochromogen in mammalian bile ; and a similar colouring matter in the bile of invertebrates' e.g. among pul- monate mollusca, in the crayfish, and latterly in Patella. In inverte- brates it is undoubtedly connected with the pigments found in their tissues which I have named histohaematins, and it is quite possible that in the sheep and ox it may be a metabolite of the same pigments, and of myohaematin. If the spectrum of ox and sheep bile when it contains the above pigment be compared with that of the histohaematins, there is a strong likeness (cf. also spectrum of medulla of adrenals). These observations so far prove that in the bile of the sheep and ox a colouring matter is found which must be a haematin derivative, (and a mere inspection of its spectrum would suggest that it may be a mixture of alkaline haematin and haemochromogen). Does this furnish biliverdin ? or is biliverdin formed from it ? Physiologists are fond of appealing to the simple structure and functions of the lower animals for a reply to complex questions of human physiology, and in the present case some observations recently made by me on Sea-anemones may help to answer the question. In the common red Actinia mesemhrijantltemum a colouring matter occurs which is changeable into haemochromogen and haematoporphyrin. Now in the mesoderm and elsewhere in the same animal, I have found biliverdin beyond doubt. There at least it no doubt is the metabolite of the useless pigment which is no longer fit for respiration, and I believe it is the same with the biliverdin of bile. I have already shewn that biliverdin was present in a hydrocele fluid into which blood had been extravasated, and I have seen in the lobule of the liver of a pigeon squeezed out in the compressorium and examined in the manner de- scribed before the Physiological Society, in one part haemochromogen, in another biliverdin, which filled the ultimate radicles of the biliary ducts in the lobule. Hence it appears to me that biliverdin is broken down and changed haematin. With regard to this pigment of the bile of the sheep and ox, in order to avoid confusion, I think it ought to be called by a name which will distinguish it from other pigments: perhaps cholohaeniatin is as appropriate as any other. The idea that the pigment described above is chlorophyll can be disproved by a comparison of its spectra with those of chlorophyll.