CURRENT LITERATURE 
BOOK REVIEWS 
The simple plant bases 
A recent book by Trier’ will interest students of plant physiology and 
plant chemist 
he plant aes are divided into ice classes: (1) the high molecular, 
eagle active alkaloids peculiar to certain plants; (2) the simple 
alkaloids without known peculiarities and widely distributed in the plant king- 
dom; () the basic splitting products of the protoplasmic constituents, as 
proteins, nucleic acids, lecithins, etc. Plant alkaloids are nitrogen-containing 
bodies which arise in the formation or transformation of protoplasmic sub- 
stances. By synthetic processes the reaction capacity of their basic H atom is 
locked up in such a way as to render them unavailable for resynthesis of 
protoplasmic substances. The primary amines are the simplest alkaloids. 
They are formed by the Scaling’ up of the carboxyl group of the corresponding 
amino acids. The simplest case would be the removal of a molecule of CO:. 
The amines of nearly all of the amino acids are known. They are seldom found 
in higher plants as they are at once converted into higher alkaloids either by 
condensation or by the simple process of methylation, which is a very general 
process in plants and has the effect of throwing the methylated body out of the 
field of chemical activity. The betains are completely methylated amines. 
This relates them directly to the amino acids. They are simple alkaloids and 
may be further defined as substances in which one assumes an intra-molecular 
saturation of the amino group with the acid carboxyl group. They cannot 
replace cholin in the lecithin molecule. 
Deets, Js 
CH, aye ty CH, Bi — 
| CH; | XCH; 
By ay F, Coon OH 
Betain (glycocoll betain) (hydrated form) 
Cholin is formed by a Heese process of colamin — 
which is the primary amine of serin. This methylation occurs within the 
lecithin complex; therefore it is not a primary building stone of lecithin but 
appears only as a hydrolytic product of this substance. Xanthin bases also 
undergo methylation, as caffein from xanthin. 
The hypothesis formulated to explain the formation of the simplest amino 
* Trier, Georc, Uber einfache Pflanzenbasen und ihre Beziehungen zum Aufbau 
der Eiweisstoffe und Lecithine. pp.iv+117. Berlin: Gebriider Borntraeger. 1912+ 
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