Excerpts

In an attempt to find the reason why the anaerobic breakdown of glucose in brain is less in poliomyelitis, experiments were performed using sodium fluoride as an inhibitor (Table II). The percentage inhibition resulting from fluoride was consistently higher in the normal than in the infected brain, particularly with lower concentrations of fluoride. The residual glycolysis in poliomyelitic brain treated with fluoride was equal to the glycolysis in normal brain with fluoride in every experiment. One of the major effects of fluoride is to inhibit glycolysis at the stage of breakdown of phosphoglycerate to phosphopyruvate. In contrast to the results with fluoride, preliminary experiments indicate that monoiodoacetate exerts an equal inhibitory effect on anaerobic glycolysis of normal and poliomyelitic brain suspensions…

TABLE II
The Effect of Sodium Fluoride on Anaerobic Glycolysis…

SUMMARY
1. During paralysis, the brain of the mouse infected with poliomyelitis virus shows on test after mincing a decrease in anaerobic glycolysis with no significant change in oxygen utilization. The decrease in anaerobic glycolysis varies from 5 per cent to 50 per cent.

2. Sodium fluoride produces a greater inhibition of anaerobic glycolysis in normal than in poliomyelitic brain…