162 AEROBIC FERMENTATIONS 



philus and Chironomus thummi, when kept under aerobic 

 conditions, liberate considerable amounts of carbon diox- 

 ide from bicarbonate (Harniscli, 1943). Good evidence is 

 also available for the larva of Gastcro philus intv.stinalis. 

 Von Kemnitz (1916) showed that this insect produces much 

 less carbon dioxide than would correspond to the glyco- 

 gen disappearing from the body if one assumes that this 

 glycogen is completely oxidized. It follows that some of 

 the polysaccharide is only partially oxidized. 



Melampy and Willis (1939) found respiratory quotients 

 of 1.14 to 1.29 and 1.03 to 1.42 in larval queens of the 

 honeybee and larval workers, respectively, at the oxy- 

 gen tension of atmospheric air. They interpret this find- 

 ing as an indication of the synthesis of fats from carbo- 

 hydrates, a process that, from a biochemical standpoint, 

 must be classified with fermentations in an excess of 

 oxygen. 



2. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF AEROBIC FERMENTATIONS AND 



THEIR RELATIONSHIPS WITH OTHER TYPES OF 



OXIDATIONS 



Two questions of special interest arise here : (A) Why 

 are some oxidations incomplete in some animals in the 

 presence of oxygen? and (B) What are the relationships 

 between incomplete and complete oxidations? These 

 points will be discussed separately. 



A. Reasons for the occurrence of incomplete oxida- 

 tions in the presence of oxygen. Incomplete oxidations, 

 as was said above, take place in some animals which ex- 

 perience no difficulty in securing oxygen in such amounts 

 that all the energy needed could be gained by complete 

 oxidations. One must further remember that the ad- 

 ditional amounts of oxygen that would be required to 

 furnish a quantity of energy comparable to that gained 

 by the fermentations must be relatively small, since fer- 

 mentations yield only little energy while much more is 



