After exposure to the rays these fats were fed to a group of experimental rats in which rickets had been produced, and the activated olive oil and lard were found to have the same beneficial results that follow the administration of cod liver oil. The weight of the rats increased and an analysis of the bones showed an increase in the calcium content.
Some of the activated olive oil, which had been stored in a stoppered bottle, showed no change in potency ten months later. It was found also that the fats might be activated by the rays from the open carbon arc, the iron arc, and sunlight; but that exposure for such prolonged periods as 17 hours destroyed their potency. This destruction took place even on cod liver oil.[5]
It has long been known that human tissue is more actively changed by light when it has been “sensitized.” Quinine, esculin, fluoresceine, etc., are examples of tissue sensitizers, in addition to their other effects. The most powerful of all known sensitizers is haemato-porphyrin—or simply “porphyrin.” This sensitizer is a purple substance closely allied to the haemoglobin that gives blood its red color. Subtracting its iron and albumin from haemoglobin by appropriate chemical processes leaves porphyrin. This substance reacts strongly to the ultra-violet rays, in rare cases causing a disease which turns the teeth to a deep purple hue. Victims of this uncommon ailment have to wear gloves constantly, and when going out of doors during the day time must put on heavy veils.[6] Porphyrin is capable of dissolving the red corpuscles of the most dissimilar animals in the presence of sunlight. But neither the haemato-porphyrin nor the light alone is capable of injuring the animals. Only the combined effect of the two can harm them. A physician experimentally injected an exceedingly minute quantity into himself and then exposed himself to a moderate light, and became very ill.
Hausmann found that even the diffused sunlight of an early spring day in Vienna was sufficient to cause the death of white mice which had been subjected to small quantities of this strange substance. Dr. E. C. Van Leersum, of Holland, proved by experiments with rats that the utilization of lime by our bodies can be controlled almost at will by this “sensitization” process. Rickets, or a condition indistinguishable from rickets, can be produced or cured by proper control of the sensitization.
SUNLIGHT AND INFANTILE PARALYSIS
An article by Science Service, quoted in Science, September 11, 1925, says:
Another of the dreaded diseases of childhood, infantile paralysis, which, like rickets, graduates large quotas of cripples, has responded to the good influence of the sun’s rays. Dr. G. Murray Levick, medical director of the Heritage Craft Schools at Chailey, Sussex (England), who originated the treatment, said that no other method has ever had as good results as this in the treatment of infantile paralysis.
Dr. Levick first deduced that neurasthenia in grown-ups and rickets in the young are due to the same cause. Both these diseases, he claims, are nutritional disturbances of the nerve centers affecting the bones in the young, and the nervous systems in the old. The action of sunlight on the skin forms a substance which is carried into the blood and feeds the nerve centers as well as the bones. His success in treating neurasthenia with sun’s rays led him to apply it to cases of infantile paralysis, a disease which is a severe shock to the nervous system and which results in muscular atrophy. Under the action of sunlight a renutrition of nerve centers takes place.
Synthetic sunlight produced by him with an electric arc light of his own invention proved as good as natural sunlight, and could be better regulated to the patient’s endurance. He used two distinct kinds of light-rays, the short ultra-violet rays for nerve nutrition, and the long red and infra-red rays for muscle treatment. Red rays, as can be seen when the hand is held up against the sunlight, penetrate the flesh to a considerable extent, and can therefore stimulate the sleeping muscle.
Dr. Levick warns that immediate success must not be expected. He has found constant improvement where short daily treatments were continued over a period of several years. While the method may not be effective in extreme cases, it is nevertheless a test which will soon show after a few treatments whether any rejuvenation of the nerve fiber is taking place.