Studies in Osmotic Pressure

[摘要] After blood corpuscles have been treated for a short time with certain concentrations of boric acid that are not directly injurious to those cells, the sudden immersion of the treated corpuscles in a physiological solution of sodium chloride causes their complete hemolysis.This “boric acid hemolysis” does not occur if the addition of the physiological saline solution is made gradually or if the corpuscles are immersed, even suddenly, in more concentrated solutions of sodium chloride or of other non-hemolytic substances.That the destructive force responsible for this form of hemolysis is that of “osmotic pressure” is shown by the fact that the minimal non-hemolytic concentrations of all of the substances examined were found to be of identical “osmotic concentration.”

[学科分类] 生物科学（综合）