Carbon Monoxide as a Tissue Poison

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Abstract
When mixtures of CO and O2 were passed over wax moths, Galleria mellonella, a direct linear relation was found between % of CO and O2 required to inhibit normal behavior when CO exceeded 30%. The % of CO required to produce this effect were roughly 5-8 times those of O2 in the mixtures. The author assumed that CO combines with a catalyst normally concerned in O activation and derived an equation relating partial pressures of CO and O2 required to produce a particular degree of reduction in the velocity of oxidation in certain cells, measured in this case by change in behavior. This theoretical equation and the empirical equation of the plotted observations lead to the conclusion that the hypothetical catalyst behaves as if it were half saturated with CO in the absence of O2 at a pressure of about 27% of an atmosphere. The germination of cress seed, Lepidium sativum, was inhibited by mixtures of CO and O2 in generally the same way. Even in rats CO was shown to act as a tissue poison by taking advantage of the fact that mammals can live on O2 dissolved in their blood under high pressure even when almost all their haemoglobin is combined with CO. It was concluded that the toxic action on these three organisms was caused by CO poisoning of a catalyst of oxidation contained in the cells.