Evening star., 1949-09-21
Symptoms Reproduced
Of Mysterious Disease
Scientists Report on Experiments
With Compounds E and F
By Thomas r. Henry

ny HOWUS H. 1eUTp
ATLANTIC CITY, Sept. 21-Heavy doses
of Compounds E and F-Substances ex-
creted in microscopic amounts by the cortex
OF the adrenal glands and the former Of
which lately has attracted wide attention
as a possible cure for arthritis- reproduce
the symptoms of the mysterious Cushings
disease.
This is a condition of extreme muscle
weakness and extreme lassitude Which may
continue for years. Victims become essen
TALLY helpless. They have been found in
the past almost invariably to have tumors
Of the adrenal glands which have stimu-
lated the output of hormones. The syn
drome is tied up with intricate changes in
blood composition.
This was reported to the American Chem
ical Society here by Drs. Marschelle H.
Power and Randall G. Sprague of the Mayo
Clinic, where the effects of Compound on
arthritis first were discovered. Since then
the major effort throughout the country
has been to obtain enough of it to treat
patients. The entire supply available now
is allocated to research institutions by a
committee of the National Research Coun-
Gil. At the Mayo Clinic, however, the
chemists have been more concerned with de-
termining its other properties and its
possible dangers.
CuSnlng S disease is rare malady, very
close in some of its symptoms to the
hitherto invariably fatal Addison's disease,
which was known to be due to deficiency,
rather than excess. of some of the hormones
from the adrenal cortex. Unlike Addison's
disease, however, it is reversible when the
oversupply of hormones stops Thus no
danger is seen in the controlled use of
Compound for arth1itis treatment.
Compound F. which has the same effect,
is very similar to E in it's chemical compost
ton and probably will have much the same
effect on some forms of arthritis. It, how
ever, is much rarer; and the Mayo staff
have not been able to obtain enough for
much experimental work.
Both, DR.. Power stressed in his report to
the chemists are very powerful hormones
whose full potentialities remain to be
explored.
Growing bone in test tubes in an effort
to uncover some of the processes involved
was reported by DR.. Sidney Nobel and his
associates of the Brooklyn Polytechnic In
Stitute.
Bone formation or repair depends on the
ability of certain cells to take up calcium
from the blood stream. In the test tubes
it was reported, this ability was altogether
inhibited when small amounts of the ele-
ments strontium. magnesium or copper were
placed in the solution. The latter was by
far the most powerful inhibitor.
The ability was restored when the bones
were shaken in calcium solution free Of
these contaminants. The experiments lead
to the conclusion, 1t was reported, that
some engine, an extremely potent body
chemical, takes part in the bone growing
process and that it can be put out of busi-
ness by the other elements.
= 4
This country has barely started to real
ize the enormous potentialities of German
scientific developments. the data on which
were gathered by Allied research teams after
the war, Col. Harry A. Kuhn, president Of
the Armed Forces Chemical Association, told
the assembled chemists. .-t
Only few have yet been utilized by
American industry, he said. Those which
have come into production include: Fischer
Tropsch process for making synthetic oil
from coal; white carbon black, developed
by German concern as substitute for the
scarce carbon black; chlorobromomethane
f1re-hghting liquid originally developed
for use in the fire extinguishing apparatus Of
the German Navy; synthetic mica, which
during the war was one Of the strategic
materials most difficult to obtain both in
America and Germany.