Virtanen and Laine (1937) were the first to suggest the existence of an aspartic acid decarboxylase in Rhizobium trifolii, by the isolation of beta-alanine from a 47-day fermentation mash containing aspartic acid. Shive and Macow (1946), working with hydroxyaspartic acid as a competitive analogue for aspartic acid in the metabolism of Escherichia coli, found that the addition of this compound t...

The study of the metabolism of cells by a method termed inhibition analysis (l-3) led to the initial proposal that the antibacterial index (4) is a function of the inhibited enzyme system which becomes the limiting factor for growth of the organism. It was further proposed that if the product of this enzyme system is supplied to the organism the analogue either becomes ineffective as a growth i...

Aspartic acid is prepared chemically or by the fermentation of carbohydrates. Currently, low molecular weight polyaspartic acids are prepared commercially by heating aspartic acid at high temperatures (>220 C) for several hours in the solid state. In an effort to develop a more rapid, continuous, melt polymerization scheme, aspartic acid was copolymerized with adipic, azelaic, sebacic, and dode...

In the preceding paper (1) it was found that some strains of S. muscae required the addition of a substance found in certain acid-hydrolyzed proteins (AHPF) to liberate phage in Fildes' synthetic medium when singly infected with virus. Another strain required aspartic acid to liberate phage in Fildes' synthetic medium when singly infected. Experiments reported in this paper show that such strai...

It is known that the requirement of microorganisms for certain growth factors is influenced by the nutritive medium in a manner analogous to the effect of dietary regimen of animals on their vitamin requirements. In this connection it was found by Williams and Fieger (1) that oleic acid could substitute for biotin in the growth of Lactobacillus casei under their experimental conditions. Axelrod...