A Test for Antiberi-beri Vitamine and Its Practical Application.*

In 1912, one of us (C. F.) experimented with antiberi-beri vitamine to see if it could act as a coferment in alcoholic fermentation. The experiments were unsuccessful at that time, but now through the wurk of Williams,l Bachmann,% and Eddy and Stevenson3 the subject has attained new interest.. Their results seem to prove that vit.amine act,ivity can be measured by the growth of yeast cells, and would permit of dispensing with animal experimentation in the initial stages of vitamine fractionation. Because of the uncertainty of the Bachmann fermentat,ion test and the complicated procedure of Eddy’s test, it was thought desirable to develop a more simple method which would facilitate our contemplated vitamine fractionation work, which we shall discuss in detail later on. Since our preliminary communication, Williams4 has published a method somewhat analogous to ours but nob quite so easily or so quickly manipulated.