482 SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



Zaiilbri'ckner. A. — Kryptogamae exsiccatse editaB a Museo Palatino Vindoben- 



ensi. Cent. x.-xi. (Cryptogamic exsiccata issued from 

 the Vienna Museum.) 



[Cent. x. is entirely fun<ji, and mostly microfun^i. 



Decades 25-8 of Cent. xi. include Lichens. The 



plants are both European and extra-European.] 



Ann. K. K. Nat. Hofmus. Wien Bd., xix. 



(1904) pp. 379-427. 



See also Bot. CentraJbl, xcviii. (1905) pp. 334-7. 



,. Lichenes Oranenses Hochrentinerani. (Lichens collected 



by Hochreutiner in Oran.) 



[The lichen flora resembles that of Algiers. Two 

 new forms are described.] 



Ann. Conserv. Jard. Bot. Geneve, vii.-viii. 



(1903-4) pp. 244-7. 



See also Bot. Centralbl, xcviii. (1905) p. 466. 



Lichenes a cl Damazio in montitms serra do Onro Preto 

 Brasilia lecti in herb. Barbey - Boissier asservati. 

 (Lichens collected by Damazio in Brazil and preserved 

 in the Barbey-Boissier herbarium.) 



[27 Lichens are recorded. Two varieties are new.] 

 Bull. Herb. Boiss., 2nd series, iv. (1905) pp. 134-6. 

 See also Bot. Centralbl. xcviii. (1905), p. 467. 



Sch.izoph.yta. 

 Schizomycetes. 



Bacterial Origin of Macrozamia Gum.* — It. Greig Smith found in 

 a film preparation made from a transparent colourless and gelatinous 

 gum exuding from the fruit of the Macrozamia Spiralis, a short rod- 

 shaped bacillus. A portion of the stalk attached to the fruit was cut off 

 and incubated in glucose-gelatin for two days at 30° C. The molten 

 medium was then smeared over plates of laevulose-asparagin-tannin- 

 agar, and from the slime that formed an organism was isolated. A gum 

 prepared from the slime was tested and compared with the natural gum ; 

 at first these did not entirely agree, but after an interval of six months, 

 during which the organism was under cultivation in the laboratory, it 

 was found that the gums both gave upon hydrolysis the same sugar-like 

 body, and the author, considering that this was a most important indi- 

 cation of their identity, has no doubt that the bacillus was the producer 

 of the gum exuded from the fruit. He named the organism the Bacillus 

 macrozamia}. It exists as short rods or cocco-bacteria, that vary in 

 length from * 9 /x to 2 • 2 /x, and in breadth from ■ 4 /* to • 8 yu. ; they 

 are motile, and possess numerous peritrichous flagella, and do not stain 

 by Gram. It forms slime at ordinary temperature ; it does not grow 

 under anaerobic conditions ; on glusose-gelatin plates it forms white, 

 glistening, moist, nipple-shaped colonies, and there is no liquefaction of 

 the medium ; in gelatin stab there is a rough white growth in the 

 track, and gas bubbles are formed in the medium ; on saccharose potato 

 agar a raised white slime is produced, and the medium is cleft in all 

 directions from the formation of gas ; in broth the medium is rendered 

 turbid, and carries floating broken films ; indol reaction is obtained, and 



* Proc. Linn. Soc. New South Wales, xxix. (1904) p. 863. 



