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It may be that we have not got to the end of this refined analysis yet, but at any rate, I suppose I may say and I speak with some little hesitation for fear my friend Professor Roscoe here may pick me up for trespassing upon his province but I believe I may say that now we can account for 99 per cent. at least of the sugar, and that 99 per cent. is split up into these four things, carbonic acid, alcohol, succinic acid, and glycerine.
It is, as a matter of fact, to alcoholic fermentation, properly so called, that the charge to which we have referred relates to that fermentation which yields, besides alcohol, carbonic acid, succinic acid, glycerine, volatile acids, and other products. This fermentation undoubtedly requires the presence of yeast cells under the conditions that we have named.
The brigade is sugar, the regiments are carbonic acid, succinic acid, alcohol, and glycerine. From the time of Fabroni, onwards, it has been admitted that the agent by which this surprising rearrangement of the particles of the sugar is effected is the yeast.
Subsequent inquiry, careful research with the refinements of modern chemistry, have been applied to this problem, and they have shown that Lavoisier was not quite correct; that what he says is quite true for about 95 per cent. of the sugar, but that the other 5 per cent., or nearly so, is converted into two other things; one of them, matter which is called succinic acid, and the other matter which is called glycerine, which you all know now as one of the commonest of household matters.
It may be that we have not got to the end of this refined analysis yet, but at any rate, I suppose I may say and I speak with some little hesitation for fear my friend Professor Roscoe here may pick me up for trespassing upon his province but I believe I may say that now we can account for 99 per cent. at least of the sugar, and that 99 per cent. is split up into these four things, carbonic acid, alcohol, succinic acid, and glycerine.
The greater part of this deficit is accounted for by the discovery of two substances, glycerine and succinic acid, of the existence of which Lavoisier was unaware, in the fermented liquid. But about 1-1/2 per cent. still remains to be made good. According to Pasteur, it has been appropriated by the yeast, but the fact that such appropriation takes place cannot be said to be actually proved.
M. Bechamp, who studied these, recognized several belonging to the series of fatty acids, acetic acid, butyric acid &c. "The presence of succinic acid is not accidental, but constant; if we put aside volatile acids that form in quantities which we may call infinitely small, we may say that succinic acid is the only normal acid of alcoholic fermentation."
Subsequent inquiry, careful research with the refinements of modern chemistry, have been applied to this problem, and they have shown that Lavoisier was not quite correct; that what he says is quite true for about 95 per cent. of the sugar, but that the other 5 per cent., or nearly so, is converted into two other things; one of them, matter which is called succinic acid, and the other matter which is called glycerine, which you all know now as one of the commonest of household matters.
Thus we have come to this conclusion, as the result of our inquiry, that the fermentation of sugar, the splitting of the sugar into alcohol and carbonic acid, glycerine, and succinic acid, is the result of nothing but the vital activity of this little fungus, the torula.
The greater part of this deficit is accounted for by the discovery of two substances, glycerine and succinic acid, of the existence of which Lavoisier was unaware, in the fermented liquid. But about 1-1/2 per cent. still remains to be made good. According to Pasteur, it has been appropriated by the yeast, but the fact that such appropriation takes place cannot be said to be actually proved.
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