ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY, MICROSCOPY, ETC. 671 



The coloured culture medium could be bleached by reducing substances 

 (hydrosulpkite of sodium, etc.). Reducing bacteria acted very weakly. 

 An account is also given of the effect produced by the addition of 

 nitrogen on the development of the fungus. 



Research on Aspergillus.*— P. Baccarini has made culture experi- 

 ments with a species, A.flavus, that grew on decaying flowers of Capparis 

 sicula. He obtained a plentiful crop of conidiophores and conidia, and, 

 when these died down, sclerotia were formed. He found these two sub- 

 races constantly appearing, one forming conidiophores, the other sclerotia. 

 He obtained still another species, of which he gives cultural details. 



B. Sauton | has made experiments with the spores of Aspergillus 

 niger inoculated on pigeons. They germinate in and destroy the tissues 

 of the animal after they have been treated with extract of A.fumigatus. 

 This substance protects them from the phagocytes until they germinate, 

 and then the mycelium kills the animal. 



G. Bertrand and M. Javillier % have tested the influence of zinc and 

 manganese on cultures of Aspergillus niger. They secured finer growths 

 with an addition of small quantities of both substances to the culture 

 medium. Better results were obtained with the two together than with 

 each separately. 



A. Sartory and G-. Bainier § have secured a yellow pigment from the 

 perithecia of species of Aspergillus, notably from A. scheelii. It is 

 fluorescent in the different solutions they made, but they did not succeed 

 in getting crystals. After evaporation the residue was resinous. 



Notes on Erysiphe8e.[|— Yittorio Peglion has made a series of obser- 

 vations on different oidia. The Oidium of the oak has been very pre- 

 valent of late years, and he concludes that the fungus winters in the 

 buds of the host, and is therefore independent of any Ascomycetous 

 form. He compares with it the Oidium of the apple, 0. farinosum, of 

 which the perfect fruiting-form has only recently been discovered, and 

 the mildew of the rose, which winters by its mycelium in the buds. The 

 summer form is thus all the more important, if it is independent of any 

 winter fruiting-stage. 



Physalosporina, a New Genus of Pyrenomycetes.f — X. "Woronichin 

 found the new fungus on leaves of Caragana frutex from Gouv. Samara. 

 It forms a broad flat rose-coloured or white stroma on the leaves, some- 

 thing like a Polgstigma, but is judged by the writer to be nearly akin to 

 Physalospora, and placed by him in the Pleosporacese. He has trans- 

 ferred several other species to the same genus, all of them characterized 

 by a stroma. 



Development of the Spores in Pleurage zygospora.** — M. Lewis 

 reports that this species, formerly reported only from Italy, is found 



* Bull.Soc. Bot Ital., 1911, pp. 47-55. 

 t Comptes Rendus Acad. Sci. Paris, clii. (l'Jll) pp. 1697-S. 

 X Comptes Rendus Acad. Sci. Paris, clii. (l'Jll) pp. 900-2. 

 § C.R. Soc. Biol. Paris, lxx. (1911) pp. 776-7. 

 | Atti R. Accad. Lincei, cccviii. (1911) pp. 687-91. 

 «j[ Ann. Mycol., ix.(19i 1 ) pp. 217-25. 

 ** Bot. Gaz., li. (1911) pp. 369-73 (1 pi.). 



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