Page 59 - Ethel D. Hume - Bešam ili Paster: Izgubljeno poglavlje u istoriji biologije

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BfiGHAMP OR PASTEUR?
56
called fermentation is, in reality, the phenomenon of
nutrition, assimilation, disassimilation and excretion of
the products disassimilated." 1
Thus we see how clear and complete was Bechamp's
explanation of fermentation so long ago as the year 1857.
He showed it to be due to the life processes of living
organisms so minute as to require a microscope to render
them visible and in the case of his sugared solutions he
proved them to be air-borne. Not only was he in-
contestably the first to solve the problem, but his initial
discovery was to lead him a great deal further, unfortun-
ately far beyond the understanding of those who, devoid
of his insight of genius, became merely obsessed by the
idea of atmospheric organisms. But before we proceed
to delve deeper in Bechamp's teaching, let us pause and
return to Pasteur and see how his work was affected by the
great beacon wherewith his rival had illumined science.
1 In modern phraseology these processes are known as nutrition, construc-
tive metabolism, destructive metabolism and the excretion of the waste
products of the last named process.

Who Proved Fermentation in a Chemical Medium to be due to
Air-borne Living Organisms :

BfiCHAMP or PASTEUR?

BfiCHAMP PASTEUR
4
2 3 1857
1 855 and 1857
LACTIC FERMENTATION
Experiments upon perfectly
pure cane-sugar in distilled Experiment with ferment
water, with or without the obtained from a medium of
addition of different salts, air sugar, chalk, caseine or fibrin
in some cases excluded, in and gluten and sown in yeast
others admitted. broth (a complex solution of
albuminoid and mineral mat-
ters) in which sugar had been
dissolved with the addition of
(2) Comptes Rendus de VAcadimie des
Sciences 40, p. 436. chalk.
(3) C. R. 46, p. 44. See also Annates
de Chimie et de Physique, 3c sdrie, 54, (4) Comptes Rendus de VAcadimit des
p. 28. Sciences 45, p. 913.