SELECTED PAPERS 



of higher education and of economically valuable direct applications 

 of scientific research, there are, however, external factors, largely in- 

 ternational pressure coupled with powerful export interests, that have 

 incidentally forced the Netherlands' government to make an excep- 

 tion for the field of virus research. In the State Veterinary Research 

 Institute in Rotterdam a number of scientists have, for several years, 

 been in a position to devote themselves entirely to the study of the 

 virus of foot-and-mouth disease. Under the active guidance of the 

 Director, Dr. H. S. Frenkel, several important results have already 

 been obtained, especially pertaining to the in vitro cultivation of the 

 virus in tissue cultures. In conjunction with the present problem I 

 must refrain from discussing these advances; but I wish to emphasize 

 that the Director immediately realized that the planned investigations 

 could not be expected to bear fruit except through the co-operation of 

 a biochemist. Now this biochemist, Dr. L. W. Janssen, in addition to 

 carrying out his successful experimental studies, e.g., on the purification 

 of the virus, has become increasingly engrossed in the general problem 

 of biosynthesis. In consequence he has developed some ideas that un- 

 questionably merit our full attention, and with Janssen's kind per- 

 mission I am in the fortunate position of being able to communicate 

 some of his as yet unpublished results. I need not mention that I can 

 only give you a glimpse of these fruits of prolonged cogitation and 

 extensive studies of the literature; a final evaluation of Janssen's con- 

 tribution should therefore be postponed until his publication, now 

 in preparation, has appeared in print. Briefly summarized, his results 

 imply that he has demonstrated the feasibility of interpreting the gen- 

 esis of the many hundreds of very heterogeneous organic compounds, 

 encountered as multifarious mixtures in man and in the most diver- 

 gent representatives of the plant- and animal kingdoms, as the end 

 result of transformations of groups of glucose molecules in such a man- 

 ner that the initial and final stages are separated by a small number 

 of oxido-reduction and condensation reactions that proceed with as- 

 tonishing regularity. An important aspect of the proposition is that 

 the gradual transformation of the sugar molecules is conceived as prog- 

 ressing on an 'assembly belt' which has a structure composed of nucleo- 

 proteins with the arginine components of the proteins as well as the 

 nucleotide moiety representing the essential agents for the transforma- 

 tions. I cannot discuss in detail the many merits of the ideas advanced 



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