384 Journal of Agricultural Research voi. xv, no. 7 



These results seem to point to the absence of any marked difference in 

 the starch-digesting capabilities of normal and blighted spinach. This 

 being the case it would seem to be indicated that the cause of carbo- 

 hydrate accumulation should be sought in the deeper-lying metabolic 

 processes in connection with which carbohydrates are utilized. 



To recapitulate, it appears that in spinach-blight the process of carbo- 

 hydrate manufacture is not inhibited, although it may be retarded. 

 The reducing sugars are practically absent from the roots of all plants, 

 while in the tops the normal plants contain somewhat more than the 

 diseased. Both sucrose and starch are present in the leaves of the 

 blighted plants in markedly greater quantity than in those of the normal 

 plants. They are found in the roots of both healthy and diseased plants 

 in approximately like quantities. 



Determinations of diastatic activity failed to bring out any marked 

 difference between healthy and diseased plants. 



It is indicated that carbohydrate accumulation is due not to a break- 

 down of digestion but to some partial failure in the subsequent metabolic 

 processes in connection with which carbohydrates are used. 



