ACTION OF PHENOL ON PROTEINS.

351 with those obtained by the examination of the lates gelatin is, unlike phenol, not then absorbed by Phenol forms associated drafted men. But these survevs are of relative value it to any great extent. ly. owing to the different views held as to what molecules in some solvents-e.g., benzol-whereas no ",.illy constitutes a goitre. It is most important resorcinol does not. The inorganic colloids had not that a uniform method of examination and record absorptive power for phenol, but soap, although The ould be adopted in all districts, and indeed in all coagulated, showed two stages of absorption. ntries, and that some degree of abnormality should denaturation of albumin by various means, including In America some electrolysis, has recently been studied by H. Mastin be decided on as a standard. resurveyshavebeen made, and with due precautions and C. B. Schryver,4who find that a well-defined these should yield information of value in cletermining acidic product is formed containing an increased any change in the incidence of goitre which may have number of acid groups, but not of basic groups, and curred as a result of the adoption of prophylactic bring forward evidence for a new type of linkage of measures in any given area. If possible, they should be carbon and sulphur in proteins. The former work was made under the same supervisor, so that the personal done at the University of Birmingham, the latter in factor remains constant. connexion with the work of the Adhesives Committee So variable have been the reports from different of the Department of Scientific and Industrial places, that it remains difficult, for example, to decide Research. Both researches have an important bearing whether the general administration of iodine to school- on those irreversible changes induced by phenols or children in goitrous areas is desirable. In the Central by electric shock, which are associated with death. States, as in other parts of the world, this measure is said to give good results, and it can hardly be thought CANCER IN THE FIELD. unreasonable where its aim is merely to raise the intake THE aetiology of cancer can be approached in many of iodine to a normal level. The results, however, are conflicting, and in any case it is unwise in this ways. At one end of the scale we have Dr. W. E. to the of wholesale use iodised Gye’s intensive investigations in the laboratory, - country encourage the other end Dr. L. W. Sambon’s expeditions in preparations, some of which certainly contain far more at of the drug than the body normally requires. In the search of significant relations between incidence and wise words of Dr. Donald Guthrie,2 of Pennsylvania, environment. The general idea behind Dr. Sambon’s the public should be warned of the great danger work evidently is that cancer is caused by a parasite, in the self-administration of iodine for the treatment or by something like a parasite, and that this agent of goitre, and physicians should have a clear under- comes from, or has some relation to, some animal or handing of the types of goitre that are amenable to plant. Observations along these lines appear in6 the iodine treatment, and of the danger which attends the third report of the Cancer Field Commission its incorrect use." Instead of this, we see articles in which works under his direction, with the support the lay press and notices in chemists’ shops instructing of the Tropical Disease Prevention Association people to regard iodine as a general tonic, and and with financial aid from the British Empire Cancer Campaign. This report describes researches on the especially as a preventive or cure for goitre. epidemiology of cancer made during 1925 in Italy and Holland, and deals incidentally with so extraordinary a diversity of topics that it is possible to summarise ACTION OF PHENOL ON PROTEINS.

only

a

few of them.

Cancer distribution and

cancer

POISONING by drinking phenolic disinfectants stillprevalence, says Dr. Sambon, vary from place to occurs with sufficient frequency to render any study place, irrespective of climate, race, food, type of of the action of such bodies on the constituents ofdwelling, habits, and customs. As a rule cases of cancer the animal of interest to the medical profession. Inare distributed in groups or clusters ; a first case is the current number of the Journal of Physical Chemistry usually followed by one, two, three, or more cases, E. Ashley Cooper and E. Sanders describe work oneither in the same house or in adjoining or neighbourthe relations of phenol to proteins and other colloids.ing houses. Frequently in a cancer cluster the patients Cooper and Woodhouse in 1923 had found that the are affected in the same organ, which suggests a uptake of phenol from aqueous solutions by proteins common source of infection. The evidence in favour in its first stage followed the partition law—that is, of these statements consists of maps and case-lists tht’re was a consistent ratio between the concentration vouched for by local physicians and by civil and of phenol in the aqueous solution and the protein. ecclesiastical but the propositions are authorities, As the concentration of phenol was increased, the so fundamental that they can hardly be accepted protein began to absorb greater (up to 12 times) without more information than Dr. Sambon offers ; proportions of phenol and to separate from the questions which they would answer are among The present work has been carried out on the pro- the most difficult in statistical epidemiology. Followteins of serum, on the muscle proteins, myosinogen, the assumption that cancer is indeed a disease ing and pa.ramvusinogen, on the vegetable proteins of places, Dr. Sambon naturally proceeded to investideatin and gliadin, on gelatin treated in various the fauna and flora of implicated localities. gate ways, and on such inorganic colloids as ferric hydroxide Considerable attention was paid to worms, for. like hydrosol and silicic acid as well as on soap. The many others, he interprets Fibiger’s production of authors point out that there is great similarity cancer by irritating rats’ stomachs with the worm between the action of phenol, of alcohol, and of heat ; Gongylonema neoplasticum as evidence that the they remark that those bacteria which are most worm either carries a parasite which causes cancer susceptible to the disinfection by alcohol and phenol or sets up a condition which favours the entrance of are also most susceptible to the action of hot water, such a parasite. A number of interesting observations the action in all cases being apparently due to were made of the occurrence of species of Gongylonema de-emulsification of the protein. Heat coagulation in men, pigs, cattle, and rats, and in their intermediate t’f proteins like that produced by phenol is known to hosts and beetles), and Dr. C. Bonne (cockroaches wcurin two stages—first denaturation, then agglutina- describes in detail a wild rat caught in Italy which had tion. It appears that the second of these stages is an tumour of the cardiac end of the stomach epithelial associated with the greatly increased solvent power associated with the worut Hepaticola gastrica—a of the protein for phenol, denaturation having no coincidence which has been seen three times before. rtfect on the partition of phenol between water and The known of worm-infection preceding examples protein. The increased absorption the authors are cancer in men and animals are reviewed, and Dr. inclined to attribute to association of molecules of Sambon rightly points out that, whatever the details phenol. This view is somewhat supported by the of the association may be, it is no doubt possible to relative behaviour of phenol and the less toxic control the prevalence of wornus by hygienic methods dihydric phenol resorcinol which although it coagu- and so, to a greater or less degree, control the

solution. I

2

Therapeutic Gazette, Dec. 15th. 1926. 3 Jour. Phys. Chem., 1927, xxxi., 1.

4 5

Biochem. Jour., 1926, xx., 1177. Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, August 16th, 1926.