118 



MOLECULES, VIRUSES, AND BACTERIA 



400 



9C 



r 

 m 



H 

 H 



300 



H 

 CO 



200 



100 



4 6 



TIME IN HOURS 

 Figure 5. pH and sum of pyruvic and acetic acids vs. time. 



of these acids supplies the energy needed for the synthesis of the spore 

 material. 



These observations led us to investigate various inhibitors to see 

 if compounds that would inhibit the utilization of intermediates might 

 also interfere with sporulation. The first one we studied was a-picolinic 

 acid (Gollakota and Halvorson, 1960). It is obvious why we selected 

 this one. We believed that it might serve as an analogue for dipicolinic 

 acid and might interfere with its synthesis and thus interfere with the 

 production of the spores. The results obtained with this inhibitor were 



