114 Stereochemistry Applied to Biology 



instances being cited to show that not only may complex organic substances exist 

 in a number of stereoisomeric forms, but also that (in accordance with the modi- 

 fications in the arrangements of the elements, groups, or masses of the molecules 

 of corresponding substances) there are associated related dependent differences in 

 physiological, toxicological, or other properties. Evidence is given which leads to 

 the deduction that starch may exist in countless stereoisomeric forms, each having 

 distinctive properties. Subsequent chapters contain descriptions of the starch- 

 substance and the structure, form, and mechanism of formation of the starch- 

 grain; of peculiar kinds of starch and starch-like bodies; of the primary and re- 

 verted decomposition products of starches, including references to the processes 

 involved in giving rise to them, and to the various forms of dextrins and sugars and 

 unusual products ; and of assumed processes in the synthesis of starch. Then are 

 given the methods heretofore used to differentiate starches and a consideration of 

 the digestibility of raw and boiled starches, with especial reference to certain 

 popular misconceptions regarding the latter. A chapter is devoted to quotations 

 of histological descriptions of over 1,200 starches obtained from an exceedingly 

 large variety of plants and plant-parts. The final chapters embrace statements of 

 the methods employed in the investigation and the demonstration of the differen- 

 tiation and specificity of starches in relation to genera, species, etc. 



Part II comprises the laboratory records of the histological, physical, and 

 physico-chemical properties of over 300 starches, representing 105 genera and 34 

 families, which serve as the basis of the research, including 10 text charts of re- 

 action intensities and an index of the starches. 



The general conclusion reached from the results of these two researches is that 

 corresponding complex organic metabolites (such as proteins, starches, glycogen, 

 fats, chloesterins, etc.) are modified specifically in relation to genera, species, etc., 

 and that, as a corollary, differences in the properties of such corresponding stereo- 

 isomers constitute a strictly scientific basis for the classification of plants and 

 animals and also offer a logical basis for the study of those structural, chemical, 

 and physiological properties of protoplasm which have their expression in heredity, 

 mutations, variations, sex, and a host of problems of normal and abnormal biology, 

 general and special. 



No. 270. REICHERT, E. T. A Biochemic Basis for the Study of Problems of Tax- 

 onomy, Heredity, Evolution, etc., with especial reference to the Starches 

 and the Tissues of Parent and Hybrid, Stocks, and to the Starches and 

 the Hemoglobins of Varieties, Species, and Genera. Quarto, 834 pages. 

 Published 1919. Price $18.00. 



Part I. Summaries and Comparisons of the Properties of the Starches and of the 

 Tissues of Parent-stocks and Hybrid-stocks. Applications of the Results of the 

 Researches to the Germ-plasm, Variations, Fluctuations, Sports, Mutants, Species, 

 Taxonomy, Heredity, etc. Notes and Conclusions. Pages xi+i to 376, 34 plates, 

 820 charts. 



Part II. Special, General, and Comparative Laboratory Data of the Properties of 

 the S'tarches and of the Tissues of Parent-stocks and Hybrid-stocks. Pages 

 vn +377 to 834. 



This research is complementary and supplementary to Publications 116 and 173, 

 and is like them in the nature of a preliminary investigation. Facts have been 

 accumulating along various and diverse lines of inquiry that are in support of 

 the following propositions: that vital properties may be reduced to a physico- 

 chemic basis ; that corresponding complex organic metabolites exist in stereoisom- 

 eric forms that are modified specifically in relation to and therefore diagnostic 

 of the protoplasmic source ; that the study of the genesis of protoplasm, individuals, 

 sex, varieties, species, and genera is a study of the genesis of chemical interactions 

 and compounds and of applications of the laws of physical chemistry. The methods 

 of study pursued include examinations of the histologic, polariscopic, physico- 

 chemic and chemic properties of starches, chiefly of the property of gelatinizability, 

 which property, as has been found, is a physico-chemic unit-character that may be 

 expressed in as many physico-chemic unit-character-phases as there are agents to 

 elicit them. The values of these phases and other reactions can be stated in fig- 

 ures, reduced to charts, and shown in their sum-totals to be as distinctive of the kind 

 of starch and the plant source as are botanic characters of the plant. 



