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Show I Important New Discoveries About the Mysterious Little Duct a less Glands That MayJSoon Enable jjjj I J IB! 81bbIU IN the laboratories of the Rockefeller Institute in New York, where scientists scien-tists arc spending the interest on a good many of the Oil King's millions in the effort to find new ways of combating combat-ing disease, relieving human suffering and prolonging life, they have recently been making some remarkable expert-nir'-.ts v-ith salamanders. One set .if salamanders was fed continuously con-tinuously on a diet of earthworms. Another An-other set of the little creatures, of the same age and approximately the same size as the first set when the experiment-; began, was fed on a diet which m-kicird m-kicird liberal quantities of the anterior lobo of the pituitary body, the mysterious litile ductieu gland that is hidden away in a bony recess of our skulls at the base of the brain These experiments hae extended over a period of three years, and the results a recently given to the public are con-Mt-rcd of the greatest importance. The salamanders that were fed on the .-interior lobe of the pituitary body developed de-veloped into veritable giants. They at-uined at-uined a size 96 per cent greater than that of the salamanders which were :iade to get along on a diet composed exclusively of earthworms. This result confirms a theory which science has long held that the secretion secre-tion which the pituitary body pours into the blood plays an important part m regulating the growth of the body When the pituitary is overactive and pours into,the blood an abnormally large quantity of its secretion the body grows to enormous size and we have a giant. On the other hand, when the little gland is sub-normal and does not supply the blood stream with as much material as it should the growth is stunted and wo have a dwarf. As there seems to be no question that it was the difference in their diet which made the salamanders grow so differently, differ-ently, science is convinced it was right in thinking the control of stature rests very largely with the quuntity, and perhaps per-haps the quality as well, of the pitui-tary's pitui-tary's secretion. With the aid of the facts the patient -cientists at the Rockefeller Institute have brought to light science will probably proba-bly soon be able to make giants or dwarfs and to prevent or check the development de-velopment of either. The adding to a person's stature, which the Bible says can never be accomplished by the taking tak-ing of much thought, will be achieved in another way by the application of some of the wonder-working principles of modern chemistry. Of course, there is much ground to be covered before we can expect to reg-u reg-u 1 a t e children's growth, to say whether they shall grow up fco be tall or short, or only of medium height. Our knowledge of the subject is still far from complete, and as yet the experiment ex-periment of feeding feed-ing pituitary substances sub-stances to warm blooded animals has never met with the success reported in the case of the coldblooded cold-blooded salamanders. But such brilliant results have been attained in treating diseases known to be due to defects of the thyroid and other ductless glands that scientists are encouraged to hope foias great success eventually in the case of the pituitary body. The problem of regulating human growth is undoubtedly one that involves, besides the pituitary body, at least one other ductless gland, the thyroid, and perhaps more. The thyroid gland lies astride our necks, just above the windpipe and close to the larynx. In appearance it has been compared to the flaps of a purse, opened up. It has always attracted much attention because when it is enlarged en-larged it produces the prominent deformity defor-mity known as goiter. "Likening one energy machine to another," an-other," says Professor Louis Berman, of Columbia University, "the thyroid may be compared to the aeeelcrator of en automobile. That is a rough and superficial su-perficial comparison, because an accelerator accel-erator lets in more of the fuel to be burned up, while the thyroid makes the fuel more combustible It thus resemble? resem-ble? more the priimr, for n rich mixture of gasoline and air burns at a greater Velocity than a poor one. Fed on 1 rge quantifies of the ank-nor lobe of the pitui- ' ffivL : . JbI tary body (the pet-like gland at the base of the g brain), this salamander grew to be 96 per cent sft w larger than the one shown below, which ate - BK only earthworms proving, science believes, J'- C&$---- I V the close relation between the pituitary and K' f the body's growth . BEZn JsK- - f Below, Tisaot's picture of the beheading of Goliath, the Philistine giant, after David had felled him with a stone ;'-'? la from his sling. Science believer the great size which rMMrTMF- wt g the Bible attributes to Goliath was due to an over- V ' a active pituitary V - - - - -- - Why a calf' 8 legs should be as long as those of a full-grown full-grown cow is one of the scientific problems to be solved by further study of the pituitary body and the thyroid gland "But the action of thyroid could really be simulated only by some substanco that could be Introduced into the best possible of gasoline mixtures, to incren ?. its combustibility by 100 per cent or more. For that is what thyroid will do to our food. Nor has it only this destructive de-structive side. "Withal there is at the same time a constructive action, for the process frees energy to be used for heat, motion or other need. The thyroid, therefore, in addition to its role as an accelerator, acts, too, as the efficient lubricator for energy transformation's. So we see it as accelerator, lubricator and transformer of our energies " While Che scientists at Rockefeller Institute In-stitute were studying the growth of their specially fed salamanders, Professor Bennett M. Allen, of the University of Kansas, was making some equally interesting inter-esting experiments with tadpoles. The results of these show that the thyroid gland must be taken into consideration along with the pituitary body as the regulator of the growth of the various parts of the body, particularly of the brain. Professor Allen found that feeding a tadpole on thyroid p;land results in changing its whole body into that of a frog or toad long before the tadpole has grown to normal size. Removing the thyroid entirely result". "Therefore David ran and stood upon the Philistine, and took his sword it out of the sheath thereof, and slew him, and cut off his head thei I Samuel, Ch. 18, Verse 6 on the contrary, in normal growth up to and far beyond the age at which metamorphosis meta-morphosis usually takes place. But the creature never changes to a frog, remaining re-maining a tadpole all its days. Hind legs appcass but they remain very small The internal organs, remain those of a tadpole and the brain retains its larval condition. Something quite similar to this happens, hap-pens, Professor Allen found, with the removal of the pituitary body, or hypophysis, hy-pophysis, as it is also called. This gland has two lobes, and as their functions are different the effects on the tadpoles varied according to which lobe was removed. re-moved. The anterior lobe of the pituitary body the part that was fed to the salamanders- -is closely linked in its functions func-tions with the thyroid gland. The thyroid thy-roid remains inactive when this lobe is removed and becomes active when some of the lobe is fed to the tadpole. As a result of his experiments with the tadpoles Professor Allen is inclined to believe that underdevelopment of the pituitary body inside our skulls causes that condition in which the bones and muscles of the body are dwarfed, but the mind remains as active as in a person of normal size. But if the thyroid is underdeveloped and is not producing sufficient secretion, then the mind is seriously affected and the afflicted person develops that form of idiocy known as cretinism. The cause of that form of dwarfism in which the trunk is prtctically normal, but the head is extremely large and the legs are unusually short, is still obscure. Professor Allen suggests that it may be due to some abnormality of the pituitary body or the thyroid gland long before birth. "The pituitary body," says Professor Berman, author of "The Glands Regulating Regulat-ing Personality," "is a lump of tissue about the size of a pea, lying at the base of the hrain, n short distance behind the root of the nose. It is of a grayish-yellow grayish-yellow color and is ciadled in a niche at the base of the skull, which, because of its form, is known as the Turkish Saddle. 'Nature's darling treasure,' it might be called, since there has be?n provided a skull within the skull to shelter it. "The extraordinarily well protected position of the pituitary, its persistence throughout life and its abundant hjond supply emphasize its vital importance. No other gland of internal secretion can adequately substitute for it. Complete expiration means death in two or three days, with a peculiar lethargy, unsteadiness un-steadiness of gait and loss of appetite, emaciation and a fall of temperature, so that the animal becomes cold-blooded, its temperature the same as that of the atmosphere it occupies. "If only part of the pituitary 's anterior lobe is taken away there occurs a remarkable re-markable fatty degeneration of the individual's in-dividual's fkin and internal organs.' A singular somnolence, a dry skin, loss of hair, a dull mentality, sometimes epilepsy epi-lepsy and a noticeable craving for sweets appear. "If part of the anterior lobe is removed re-moved from n puppy there is a cessation r marked hindering and slowing of growth. That is, dwarfs are artificially crcnted. Pathologists havo shown that in several true human dwarfs the pituitary pitui-tary is rudimentary or inadequate. All of which goes hand in hand With the evidence that the skeleton stands under the domination of the pituitary." The famous Fat Boy of Charles Dickens's Dick-ens's "Pickwick Papers, whose employ , and drew rewith." merit with Mr. Wardle consisted in alternate sleeping and eating, is cited by Professor Pro-fessor Berman Ber-man as ar excellent ex ample oi tne type of individual that results re-sults from the improper development of the pituitary. tary extract ha? been admini-tered admini-tered to human beings thus far only to a very limited extent, but the results have been extremely interesting and encouraging. en-couraging. Some day soon science hopes to see it tried out on the African pygmies. pyg-mies. Jf the children of these curiously undersized individuals can be enabled to grow to normal size by giving them pituitary or pituitary extract, it will mark the beginning of a new and amazing amaz-ing era in man's understanding and control con-trol of his body. To find out all there is to know about the mysterious ductless glands and the part they play in our bodies is perhaps the most fascinating and important problem that confronts medical science sci-ence to-day. When this has been done some authorities think we shall have the secret of the "chemistry of the soul" and shall be able to explain why human beings, living in the same environment and outwardly very much alike, develop such widoly different personalities. The ductless glands are those which have no ducts as, for instance, the salivary glands in the mouth possess, and whoso products are passed directly into the blood stream T " A Zulu dwarf, one of the many African pygmies whom science hopes some day to bring to normal size by remedying the defects in their ductless duct-less glands Among thtfin are Use tnyroid, in the neck; the four tiny parathyroids, at-xiched at-xiched to the thyroid; the pituitary iody, or hypophysis, lying a the base " me brain; the two Adrenal glands, or suprarenal bodies, lying near and above the kidneys; th pancrees and the-liver. the-liver. Every gland of the ductless variety, is Professor Benjamin arrow explain m his recent work on "(..lands in Health and Disease," manufactures a specific' ubstance that goes into the blood r am. proceeds to some other organ j HYPOPHYSIS POSTERIOR LOBE Diagram showing how carefully the pituitary body or hypophysis is protected pro-tected from harm, hidden deep in a little skull within a skull at the base of the brain i organs ind influences in-fluences it or them in some peculiar ) way The substance manufactured and sent forth by one I -here glands may b desci ibed as a "chemical niessen-Science niessen-Science has given it the name of hormone which from a Greek word meaning "to excite" or arouse " ery m inutf quantities of a hormone hor-mone are sufficient do restore the body to normal eauilib- i-uiu In thyroid deficiency, for ex- i ample, exceedingly small amount of the corresponding hormone often cures the disease. The percentage of hoimone in thl normal gland is extremely small Dr E. C. Kendall of the Mayo Foundation in Rochester, Minn., was only abl? to extract one ounce of the thyroid bor mone for more than three tons of fresh thyroid gland. These facts, in the opinion of Professor Barrow, suggest, I some connection between the hormones and the vitamines which, as has been known for some time, play a tremcn dously important part in keeping the body in a state of health. Regulation of the physical growth of the body is not the only miracle that may be within the reach of science when the. powers of the various ductless duct-less giands are thoroughly undestood, and we know how to turn them to our advantage. A great deal also probably be accomplished in the way of prevent ng or curing idiocy and feeble-minded-ness and promoting n high degree of menal development. Some enthusiastic scientists look forward for-ward to the day when, with the aid of the powerful hormqnes extracted from the little ductless glands we shall b able to make to order mental as as physical giants. |