IV. THE TRANSMISSION OF PROTEIN CHANGE 



29 



The inactivation of phage by its antibody can be regarded as a 

 result of a kind of denaturation (46). When tannic acid was used 

 instead of the antiserum a similar phenomenon was likewise observed, 

 although not so conspicuous as in the antiserum as indicated in Table 

 3 ; thus, the denaturation by tannic acid seemed to be less infectious. 

 Also with HgCl2 the same- could occur to a certain extent as seen in 

 Table 4 (64) (65). Again, heat denaturation of a protein was believed by 



Table 4 

 Infection of Inactivation of Phage 

 I. Infection of phage inactivation due to HgCla 



II. Infection of phage inactivation due to heat 



some workers to be infectious (66) (67), whereas according to the study 

 of the writer heat denaturation of phage also appeared to be so as indi- 

 cated in Table 4, where the higher the phage concentration, the more 

 striking the inactivation (65). 



Bawden and Pirie (68) showed that the rate of inactivation of 

 tomato bushy stunt virus by freezing is increased by the increase in 

 the concentration of the virus ; this might also be caused by the infec- 

 tion. Furthermore, according to Kassanis and Kleczkowski (69) the 

 ratio of inhibitor, such as ribonuclease, to tobacco mosaic virus to neut- 

 ralize the infectivity decreased as the concentration of the virus in^ 

 creased ; that is, the higher the concentration of the virus the smaller 

 is the amount of inhibitor needed to neutralize a given weight of the 

 virus. 



All these evidences suggest that the protein denaturation is gene- 

 rally infectious, and there seems little doubt that this infection occurs 

 most distinctly in the protoplasm, v/here an elaborate mechanism is 

 probably provided for the occurrence of the infection. As already dis- 

 cussed, in the blood plasm the infection seems to occur readily, whilst, 



