STUDIES IN THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE FUNGI 
II. LENZITES SAEPIARIA FRIES, WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE ТО 
Enzyme ACTIVITY 
SANFORD M. ZELLER 
Research Fellow in the Henry Shaw School of Botany of 
Washington University* 
InTRODUCTION 
This paper reports the results of an experimental study 
relating to certain physiological activities of the wood- 
destroying fungus, Lenzites saepiaria. The investigation here 
reported is concerned primarily with cultural characteristics, 
some of the factors influencing growth and metabolism, and 
the enzymic activity in the fungus. Special attention is given 
to the eyto-hydrolyzing enzymes and the relation of these to 
the decay produced by Lenzites.? 
Tur Fuxcvus 
This fungus is commonly known by lumbermen as the 
“brown punk" because of the sepia color of the small bracket- 
like sporophores. In nature it is generally found on railroad 
ties, telephone and telegraph poles, and less often on standing 
timber. It attacks coniferous timber, as a rule, but is known 
to attack frondose wood (Weir, 714). The sporophores ap- 
pear near cracks in the wood due to drying. The fruiting sur- 
face is made up of branching gills which may become so much 
1 A fellowship established by the Southern Pine Association, New Orleans, La. 
2 In the fall of 1914, in coöperation with the Southern Pine Association of 
New Orleans, it was decided to attempt a determination of the natural factors of 
wood influencing in any marked degree the growth and destructive properties 
of wood-destroying fungi, that is, durability with respect to fungous decay. While 
the results in this limited field of investigation will be reported in a later paper, 
the present study deals with those additional physiological phases which were a 
necessary and fundamental part of the general plan 
e in search for a fungus suitable to employ in such a problem, it was 
deemed important to make the results as far-reaching in the economie world a 
possible. Since practically three-fourths of the structural timber used in the 
United States is furnished by the coniferous species of trees, and since Lenzites 
saepiaria Fries is considered the fungus most destructive to coniferous wood, this 
ungus was used in the investigation. 
ANN. Mo, Bor. GARD., VOL. 3, 1916 (439) 
