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CARBON DIOXIDE IN THE BLOOD. 853
alkali diphosphate takes place. It is generally admitted that the blood-
coloring matters, especially the oxyhemoglobin, which can expel carbon
dioxide from sodium carbonate in vacuo, acts like an acid, and as the
globulins also act similarly (see below), these bodies may also occur in
the blood-corpuscles as an alkali combination. The alkali of the blood-
corpuscles must, therefore, according to the law of mass action, be divided
between the carbon dioxide, phosphoric acid, and the other constituents
of the blood-corpuscles which possess acidic properties, and among these
especially the blood pigments, because the globulin can hardly be of
importance on account of its small quantity. By greater mass action
or greater partial pressure of the carbon dioxide, bicarbonate must be
formed at the expense of the diphosphates and the other alkali combina-
tions, while at a diminished partial pressure of the same gas, with the
escape of carbon dioxide, the alkali diphosphate and the other alkali
combinations must be reformed at the cost of the bicarbonate.
Haemoglobin must nevertheless, as the investigations of Setschenow l
and Zuntz, and especially those of Bohr and Torup,2
have shown, be
able to hold the carbon dioxide loosely combined even in the absence
of alkali. Bohr has also found that the dissociation curve of the car-
bon dioxide haemoglobin corresponds essentially to the curve of the
absorption of carbon dioxide, on which ground he and Torup consider
the haemoglobin itself as of importance in the binding of the carbon
dioxide of the blood, and not its alkali combinations. According to
Bohr the haemoglobin takes up the two gases, oxygen and carbon dioxide,
simultaneously by the oxygen uniting with the pigment nucleus and the
carbon dioxide with the protein component. But as according to the
researches of Zuntz 3
the combination of haemoglobin with the alkali is
first split to any great extent with a carbon dioxide tension of more than
70 mm., it must be admitted that with the ordinary CO2 pressure in
the organism, the combination of the carbon dioxide in the blood cor-
puscles does not essentially take place through the agency of the alkali
but chieriy by means of the haemoglobin.
The chief part of the carbon dioxide of the blood is found in the
blood-plasma or the blood-serum, which follows from the fact that the
serum is richer in carbon dioxide than the corresponding blood itself.
By experiments with the air-pump on blood-serum it has been found
that the chief part of the carbon dioxide contained in the serum is given
off in a vacuum, while a smaller part can be removed only after the
1
Centralbl. f. d. med. Wissench., 1877. See also Zuntz in Hermann’s Handbuch,
76.
1
Zuntz, 1. c, 76; Bohr, Maly’s Jahresber., 17; Torup, ibid.
1
Centralbl. f. d. med. Wissensch., 1867.
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