Evening star., 1940-08-24
Of Stors, Men
And Atoms
Notebook Of Science Progress
In Field, Laboratory
And Study
BIZ Thomas r. Henri.

BY Thomas r. Henrv.
The rate Of healing Of war wounds In
many cases can be more than doubled
by chemical made in the United States
in carload lots and used widely as fer
tilizer.
The remarkable effects of urea, made
out of coal, air and water, which were
first demonstrated about five years ago
by scientists of the United States De-
partment of Agriculture, have just been
proved conclusively by experiments on
animals at Cambridge University and
recommended by the British Medical
Association for war and civilian wound
ed, according to report just received
here.
Early in the war the Strangeways
Laboratories at Cambridge, one of the
foremost biological centers in the world,
were turned over entirely to experiments
on the healing Of wounds. Laboratory
animals were subjected to all sorts of
flesh and muscular tissue wounds and
the rate of healing under different forms
of treatment studied. The results have
just been accepted by the Committee on
Wound Healing of the Medical Research
Council of Great Britain. They promise
greatly to decrease the load of military
disqualification and hasten the return to
duty of men with more or less superficial
injuries.
The story behind this is one of the
strangest in the history of medicine. In
the first World War it was observed that
wounds left untreated until they became
infested with maggots often healed more
ranidlr tn those which were dressed
almost Immediately. Following the war
this led to intensive experiments at
Johns Hopkins University in which mag
gots were deliberately placed in persist
ent ulcers. Some dramatic results were
obtained, but in order to avoid risk Of
infection the physician must be certain
that the insects themselves carried no
germs. At this point the United States
Department of Agriculture started the
breeding of sterile maggots to supply
hospitals.
1t then was found that the maggots
themselves played little part in the heal
ing process. 1t was due, the Agriculture
Department experts found, to a sub
stance eXcreted by the bugs, allantoin,
which could be synthesized in the labora-
tory. This was potent in promoting
healing, but somewhat expensive.
DR.. William Robinson. in charge of
the Department of Agriculture expert
ments, then found that one of the con-
stituents of allantoin, urea, had nearly
as good effects when used alone. This
was already in commercial production on
a large scale. In wholesale lots it costs
less than cents pound 1t had played
a significant role in the history of chem
istry. Before its synthesis in Germany
nearly century before it had been al
most universally accepted that man
never could hope to produce synthetica1ly
an organic substance. This was a seri-
Gus blow to the philosophy of vitalism
in nature which held that life itself
must act as a catalyst in the formation
of an organic product Now organic
chemicals are synthesized as easily as
inorganic.
Neither urea nor allantoin. Dr. Robin
son says, has any action whatsoever as
an antiseptic. Urea especially seems to
act solely as strong stimulator of cell
growth. Thus the normal cells around
wounded tissue are better able to resist
the invading bacteria. Scar tissue with a
good blood supply forms very rapidly
Actually, DR.. Robinson says. the use of
urea in some form on wounds has been
common among European peasantry for
centuries, but has been considered a
mere superstition by the medical profess
sion.
Urea" SAYS DR.. Robinson "is in a
class by itself for large-scale treatments,
either civilian or military It's cheap
ness, its availability in ton lots if de-
sired, the ease with which it goes into
solution, its harmlessness even in strong
concentrations and its effectiveness in
stimulating healing make it an unusually
interesting therapeutic agent One can
only conjecture what its effect might
have been if it had been used during the
first World War"
At first-aid stations, it is explained, it
might be used in conjunction with sui
fanilamide packings or dustings which
put some of the most common germs out
of action. The value is especially great.
DR. Robinson says, for refractory wounds
which fail to heal for months and
threaten to leave wounded men perma-
nent war casualties.
Hitherto the healing effects of both
urea and the more complex allantoin
have been known almost entirely from
clinical observations where various un-
known factors may have contributed to
the end result The Strangeways Labo-
ratory experiments are the first in which
all extraneous factors have been elm
mated.
Observation on Visit to