Abstract
In a great number of white rats (rattus norvegitus var. albus, Fitzinger) the main suprarenal glands were removed in two sittings.
(1) A compensatory hypertrophy occurred in the gland left behind after removal of the companion gland, but only on a small scale and never constantly.
(2) The longest life span of rats which were doubly decapsulated and in which was found no accessory cortical mass at all, was 42 days.
(3) Only 12% of the rats were capable of surviving the double decapsulation indefinitely, which shows a much greater mortality compared with the results of some laboratories, as for instance in Buenos-Aires, New York, Cleveland, etc. Whether this is due to different strains of animals, some shortening in the feeding of animals and so on, cannot be answered at present.
(4) Accessory cortical tissues were found in about 80 percent of the normal and the doubly decapsulated. And it is quite certain that accessory masses undergo enlargement on removing the main glands. The greater the amount of the accessories, the longer the animal survives, and the longer the animal survives, the greater the amount of accessories becomes, generally speaking.
No accessory cortical tissue was found in the region of the epididymis and testis, even on microscopical examination.
(5) Actual and relative weight of the suprarenal glands of normal rats are given in Table I on p. 335. In general, female rats have somewhat heavier glands than males. The relation of the weight of the suprarenal capsules to the body weight is closer in female individuals in comparison with males. The left gland was in 85 percent of the cases, heavier than the right.
