I. L. Chaikoff

Influence of Ingestion of Pancreatic Juice upon Liver Fat in Depancreatized Dog Maintained with Insulin.

Previous work has clearly established, first, that completely depancreatized dogs develop fatty livers despite their survival with insulin and a diet adequate in calories, proteins, salts and vitamins, and, second, that raw pancreas, when ingested, possesses not only preventive but curative action upon the deposition of the excessive amounts of lipids in the liver. 1 Moreover, it has been shown that Jigation of the pancreatic ducts, a process which completely excludes the pancreatic juice from the intestinal tract and which results in destruction of the acinar elements of the pancreas, is likewise followed by the appearance of fatty livers. 2 These observations would seem to suggest that a factor (or factors) which is capable of controlling the lipid content of the liver resides in the external secretion of the pancreas. It was recognized, however, that proof for this belief is lacking and might be obtained by observing the effects of the ingestion of the external secretion of the pancreas upon the liver lipids of the completely depancreatized or duct-ligated dog. The present investigation was undertaken to test this view. It shows that pancreatic juice, when fed over periods of 20 weeks, is quite active in preventing the appearance of excessive deposits of fat in the liver of the completely depancreatized dog maintained with insulin. The maintenance of depancreatized dogs in this laboratory has been described elsewhere. 1 For a variable period following pancrea-tectomy each dog received twice daily a diet containing 250 g of lean meat, 50 g of sucrose, 5 g of bone ash and 125 g of raw pancreas from which all visible fat had been removed. Vitamin supplements were furnished twice weekly.† When a vigorous appetite appeared, the feeding of raw pancreas was discontinued and each dog then received pancreatic juice twice daily (Table I) in addition to the meat, sucrose, bone ash and vitamin constituents listed above.