Abstract
It was demonstrated 1 , 2 that cortical hormone can be prepared from whole beef adrenal glands by essentially the same methods of extraction used in the preparation of cortical hormone from dissected cortex. 3 , 4 The elaboration of a biological method of assay based on the minimum maintenance requirement of the adrenalec-tomized dog 5 provided a reliable means of comparing the potency of whole adrenal extract with that prepared from dissected cortex. It has been shown that cortex extract (1 cc. represents 30 gm. beef adrenal cortex) contains 4 to 10 dog units (D. U.) per cc, the potency varying with different batches. 5
Extracts prepared from whole glands are many times as potent as those prepared from dissected cortex (on an equivalent weight basis). Whole gland extract (1 cc. represents 40 gm. whole beef adrenal gland) contains 40 to 80 D. U. per cc. The following is a summarized comparison of whole gland and dissected cortex extract:
Whole gland extracts of approximately equal potency but lower solid content can be prepared by using the same fractionation procedure as previously described but decreasing by 50% the thoroughness of extraction of the respective fractions. In this simplified technique the glands are extracted once with alcohol for 48 hours, the benzene soluble fraction is extracted twice with acetone, the acetone soluble fraction is distributed twice between 70% alcohol and petroleum ether and the alcohol soluble fraction is filtered only once through permutit. The adrenalin concentration is less than 1:2,000,000 (blood pressure-dog). Typical assay data follow:
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