BACILLUS PYOCYANEUS AND ITS PIGMENTS.
THE PRINCIPAL CONCLUSIONS THAT SEEM TO ME JUSTIFIED ARE AS FOLLOWS: 1. The fluorescent pigment formed by some varieties of B. pyocyaneus is produced under conditions identical with those governing the production of the pigment by other "fluorescent bacteria." 2. The production of pyocyanin is not dependent upon the presence of either phosphate or sulfate in the culture medium. It is formed in non-proteid as well as in proteid media, but is not a necessary accompaniment of the metabolic activities of the organism (e. g. tartrate solution). 3. The power of producing pyocyanin under conditions of artificial cultivation is lost sooner than the fluorescigenic power. 4. There are greater natural and acquired differences in pyocyanigenic power than in fluorescigenic. 5. The fluorescent pigment may be oxidized slowly by the action of light and air as well as by reagents into a yellow pigment, and pyocyanin may be similarly oxidized into a black pigment. 6. A convenient separation of B. pyocyaneus into four varieties would be the following: var. alpha, pyocyanigenic and fluorescigenic (most common); var. beta, pyocyanigenic only (rare); var. gamma, fluorescigenic only (not uncommon, closely related to "B. fluorescens liquefaciens"); var. delta, non-chromogenic. 7. Except for the occasional loss of one or another function the different varieties are not so plastic as sometimes assumed, and cannot be readily converted into one another by subjection to varying conditions of life. 8. The signification and correlation of the almost countless physiological variations among the members of this group in respect to growth in gelatin, behavior to temperature, indol production, etc., remain to be determined. It is not yet clear that the variations in chromogenic power can be in any way correlated with the presence or absence of other physiological functions.
Bacteriological Laboratory of the University of Chicago.
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Jordan