The Function of the Adrenal Cortex

The importance of the discovery of the blood-pressureraising substance of the adrenal, and the rapid development of the use of this substance in practical medicine, has caused the fact that the production of adrenalin is not the sole function of the adrenals to become much obscured. According to the experimental and analytical evidence, adrenalin is produced only by the medullary portion of the gland, thus leaving the function of the much more abundant cortical tissue to be explained; and, furthermore, we have clinical evidence that adrenalin does not represent the entire product of the adrenal gland, in the fact that we can not ordinarily relieve the manifestations of Addison's disease by administration of either adrenalin or adrenal extract. We have every reason to imagine that the cortical portion of the adrenals may be functionally entirely different from the medulla. In the first place, the histologic structure is quite different, the