The Fate of the Proteolytic Enzymes from the Pancreatic Juice of Chicks Fed Raw and Heated Soybeans

THE pancreas has been shown in chicks (Chernick et al., 1948) to respond differently to diets containing raw and heated soybeans. It hypertrophies in chicks ingesting raw soybeans but not in those ingesting heated soybeans. The proteolytic activity of the pancreas of chicks ingesting raw soybeans is also increased. While methionine overcomes in a large measure the growth depression of raw soybeans (Hayward and Hafner, 1941) it had no effect on the tendency for the pancreas to hypertrophy (Chernick et al., 1948). Raw soybeans contain, therefore, at least two inhibitors,—the antitrypsin to which the pancreas responds with hypertrophy and the methionine inhibitor which is counteracted by methionine. The methionine had little effect on the proteolytic activity of the pancreas of chicks (Chernick et al., 1948). The response of the pancreas anatomically and physiologically to the nature of the food in the gastrointestinal tract raises the question of how the …