CAROTINOIDS IN THE PHANEROGAMS 29 



Lubimcnko (1914a) has examined the pigment of the yellow turnip 

 root (Brassica Rapa L.) and finds that it contains a yellow pigment 

 soluble in 95 per cent alcohol, but which he was not able to crystal- 

 lize, and also a pigment which closely resembles lycopin, the red pig- 

 ment of the tomato. Spectroscopically the pigment appears to be 

 identical with lycopin but because of a difference in the relative inten- 

 sity of the bands as compared with lycopin, and a greater ease of 

 solubility in alcohol and concentrated acetic acid, Lubimcnko pre- 

 ferred to call the pigment a lycopinoid, a term which the author 

 regards as very unfortunate in view of the more generally accepted 

 use of the terminology -oid as applied to the carotins and xanthophylls. 



It seems possible that the pigment of the related variety of turnips, 

 namely, rutabaga (Brassica campestris L.) is of the same character. 

 The question of this type of carotinoid in roots deserves confirmation 

 and further study. 



Carotinoids in the Chloroplastids 



The tissues of all chlorophyllous plants are characterized by certain 

 specialized bodies, probably protein in nature, of microscopic size, 

 called plastids. In early stages of the plant's development and often 

 in the subterranean parts of the plant after maturity the plastids are 

 colorless. They are then called leucoplastids. More commonly they 

 develop green pigments, chlorophylls, when the plastids are called 

 chloroplastids, or chlorophyll granules. The chlorophylls in the 

 chloroplastids are always accompanied by carotinoids of both types, 

 namely, carotin and xanthophylls. 



Investigations regarding these yellow chromolipoids in the chloro- 

 plastids apparently did not begin until the observation of Fremy 

 (1860) that a yellow pigment can be obtained from green leaves by 

 allowing strong HC1 and ether to act upon the residue from the alco- 

 holic extract, or by similar treatment of the precipitate thrown down 

 from the alcoholic leaf extract by A1(OH) 3 . In this procedure the 

 ether took on a yellow color, the pigment of which Fremy called 

 phylloxanthine, leaving a blue pigment, which he called phyllocyanine, 

 in the aqueous acid layer. Fremy believed that his phylloxanthin 

 pre-existed in the leaves. 



It is now quite certain that Fremy's phylloxanthine was a mixture 

 of some of the natural carotinoids of the leaf with an acid decompo- 

 sition product of chlorophyll, a view which was expressed first by 

 Stokes (1864). The name phylloxanthin is, in fact, at present re- 



