The Structure and Composition of Hemosiderin

In the spleen, liver, and kidneys of most mammals may be found varying quantities of yellow-brown granules and to these granules has been given the general name hemosiderin. Since the formation and location of hemosiderin coincides in time and place with the destruction of blood, the idea has become firmly established that hemosiderin represents some step in the disintegration of hemoglobin and the formation of bile pigment. The question has come under consideration in many connections throughout the fields of physiology and clinical medicine. The great range of literature in which there is mention of hemosiderin may be seen in the reviews of Whipple (l), Rous (2), and Rich (3). These papers summarize and discuss the present status of the problems concerning the normal and abnormal destruction of red blood corpuscles and formation of bile pigment. It is clearly brought out that hemosiderin is in some way connected with these processes but the extensive although scattered evidence does not conclusively indicate the exact nature of the reactions involved. Nor is much known of the constitution of the substance itself save that it contains iron in some form. The fact that hemosiderin has a high iron content has led many investigators to conclude that in the breakdown of hemoglobin the iron is split off from the hematin as hemosiderin and the iron-free remainder of the molecule goes to make up the bile pigment (cf. Rich (3)). This view has found its way into the text-books (such as Wells, “Chemical Pathology”). It has seemed desirable to omit entirely all con-