*73 
O'Brien. — The Proteids of Wheat. 
Gliadin is described as being partly deposited on cooling ; 
as soluble in boiling water, to a frothy liquid ; soluble in 
alkalies, only slightly soluble in acids, and insoluble in cold 
water. It forms a transparent, straw-yellow, sweetish mass, 
which on warming gives the smell of baked apples. (This 
I have not seen mentioned by any other writer, nor have 
I noticed it in the alcohol-extract from gluten. It is very 
marked, however, in a similar extract from bran — probably 
showing form-aldehyde. Nitric acid added to this solution is 
violently decomposed with evolution of red fumes.) The 
residue, Zymom, received its name ferment) from its 
power of causing fermentation ; it does not, however, itself 
ferment. It is soluble in acids, forms a kind of soap with 
alkalies, and is hardened by limewater and alkaline carbonates. 
It forms one-third of the volume of moist gluten, and is said 
to occur in many other vegetable bodies. 
Though the name has not been adopted, I shall for the sake 
of clearness use the term Zymom*, as introduced by Taddei, 
to signify the part of gluten insoluble in boiling alcohol. 
Gliadin (yAoia, glue) having been variously used by later 
writers, I shall employ the word Glian * for the whole of the 
alcohol-soluble part of gluten. 
Berzelius 6 carried the analysis by means of alcohol a step 
further, resolving glian into — 
(1) Pflanzenleim soluble in cold as well as in hot alcohol [glutine *]. 
(2) Schleimige Stoffe precipitated from alcohol solution on cooling [myxon *]. 
For the former we may at once adopt the term proposed for 
it by De Saussure 7 in 1833, Glutine *. The latter substance 
appears later both as Fibrin and as Casein according to the 
theory of the writer : so for the sake of distinction we must 
find some name which commits us to neither view. I shall 
therefore designate as Myxon * (juvfa, slime) that part of gluten 
which is precipitated on cooling from solution in hot alcohol. 
To these constituents of gluten a fourth was added by 
De Saussure 7 , Mucine*. This name may be retained (as it 
* See table, p. 194. 
O 2 
