ON A SUPPOSED SYNTHESIS OF ANTHOCYANIN. 



By M. WHELDALE, 



Fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge ; 



AND H. Ll. BASSETT, 

 Tnnity Hall, Cambridge. 



{From the Laboratory of the John lanes HoHicidtural Institution, 



Merton, Surrey, and the Balfour Laboratory, Cambridge.) 



In a recent paper dealing with the anthocyanin pigments of plants 

 Everest' makes suggestions which are quite in contradiction to the 

 views generally held on the subject. 



His main contention is that anthocyanins are reduced products of 

 flavones, whereas most investigators have considered them to be oxidised 

 products of some aromatic chromogen. He also raises the question of 

 the mechanism of their production and the first part of his paper is 

 devoted to a criticism of an hypothesis which was brought forward b}' 

 one of us some years ago. 



The said hypothesis was based upon various observations comiected 

 with the distribution, appearance and disappearance of anthocyanin 

 pigments in plants, whereby it appeared that the formation of the 

 latter is in some way intimately connected with photosjaithesis and 

 the products of this process, i.e. sugars. Hence it was suggested ten- 

 tatively", as there was no absolute evidence either for or against it, that 

 if anthocyanins are formed from flavones (which occur in the plant as 



' Everest, A. E., " The Production of Anthocyanins and Anthocyanidius," Roy. Soc. 

 Proc. 1914, B, Vol. lxx;cvii. p. 444. 



- Wheldale, M., " On the Formation of Anthocyanin," Jourii. of Genetics, 1911, Vol. i. 

 p. 133. And later, Wheldale, M., "The Flower Pigments of ^7i(in7iinumma/«s. I. Method 

 of Preparation," Biochemical Joiirn. 1913, Vol, vii. p. 87. 



