THE researches of a number of workers, which have been undertaken in recent years in an attempt to elucidate the question as to the chemical nature of the unsaponifiable fractions of liver oils, have revealed the fact that such fractions may contain a number of hydrocarbons and alcohols of varying chemical structure. Of the alcohols, mention may be made of the occurrence in certain fish-liver oils of batyl, selachyl and chimyl alcohols [Tsujimoto and Toyama, 1922; Toyama, 1923, 1; 1924, 1, 2; Drummond and Baker, 1929]. The chemical nature of these dihydric alcohols was studied by Tsujimoto and Toyama [1922] and by Toyama [1924, 1] and later by Heilbron and Owens [1928] and Drummond and Baker [1929], who showed that they were the monoglyceryl ethers of octadecyl, oleyl and cetyl alcohols respec- tively. The presence in fish-liver oils of cetyl and oleyl alcohols has also been reported [Toyama, 1922; 1923, 1], while the latter alcohol has been found also in arctic sperm oil In addition to these alcohols, the presence of three hydrocarbons in various liver oils has been demonstrated. The unsaturated hydrocarbon, squalene, occurs in a large number of shark- liver oils In mammalian liver, a hydrocarbon of similar chemical nature to squalene occurs [Channon and Marrian, 1926]. A third hydrocarbon is isooctadecane which has been obtained from fish- liver oils by Tsujimoto [1917] and Toyama [1923, 2].
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Channon et al. (1929) studied this question.