The results published by Helz, Baldwin, and Fred confirmed earlier discoveries
that some rhizobial strains show host dependent differences in their effectiveness for
supporting plant growth. Specifically, a culture originally isolated from broad bean
(Vicia faba) produced better results on V. faba than did a culture originally isolated
from peas. The organism isolated from peas, on the other hand, gave much better
results on both peas and sweet peas than did the V. faba culture.
More importantly, Helz et al. (1927) found one bacterial strain which produced
nodules on all five of the host species studied, but that ability for inducing nodulation
somehow did not benefit the plants nitrogen economy. Ninety five years later we
learned the reason for that curious discovery when Matthew B. Crook and colleagues
published their revelation that a naturally existing plasmid results in rhizobial strains
which enhance competitiveness for nodule occupancy, but impair nitrogen fixation,
resulting in reduced benefit to the host plant (Crook et al. 2012).
14.20 “The Conquest of Bacteria from 606–693, 2nd edn”
by Sherwood Taylor, 1940
Frank Sherwood Taylor had a Doctorate in History and the Method of Science, and
he wrote interesting books on many different aspects of science. I found a copy of his
book on bacteria (Taylor 1940) in a used bookstore when I was a graduate student.
Taylor presented an informed summary about the history of research into bacterial
disease, the body’s immunologic responses, chemical disinfectants, and also antimicrobial chemotherapy. Taylor’s inspiration for that book may have been his
brothers death from tuberculosis. This book holds particular interest for me because
it describes using antibiosis for controlling infectious disease of humans. The
techniques mentioned were chemotherapy using laboratory-developed synthetic
compounds and also naturally antibiotic compounds
Arsphenamine. originally named Salvarsan, initially was designated “606”
because it was the sixth in the sixth group of compounds synthesized for testing. It
was discovered in 1909 by Paul Ehrlich, Alfred Bertheim, and Sachachiro Hata,
marketed originally in 1910 by Hoechst AG, and was the first truly effective cure for
infections caused by Treponema pallidum. William H. Benton, who was a dear
friend of mine and for a while was my laboratory technician, had been a United
States Air Force Hospital Corpsman. Bill once told me that it was always possible to
identify by x-ray if someone had received buttock injections of Salvarsan for
treatment of syphilis, because the injections left a pattern of metallic dots that looked
like shotgun pellets.
This book also describes Kl730, which later became known as Prontosil, as
discovered by Bayer chemists Josef Klarer, Fritz Mietzsch, and Gerhard Domagk.
The compound Kl730 gave rise to the sulphonamide class of antibiotics. At the time
when that book was written by Taylor, the sulphonamides which still serve us well
were relatively new, as was Sulfanilamide which consists of an aniline derivatized
with a sulfonamide group. Sulfanilamide acts by inhibiting the formation of folic
14 Discovering the Symbiotic Nature of Microbial Life: Summarizing Milestone. . .
237
that some rhizobial strains show host dependent differences in their effectiveness for
supporting plant growth. Specifically, a culture originally isolated from broad bean
(Vicia faba) produced better results on V. faba than did a culture originally isolated
from peas. The organism isolated from peas, on the other hand, gave much better
results on both peas and sweet peas than did the V. faba culture.
More importantly, Helz et al. (1927) found one bacterial strain which produced
nodules on all five of the host species studied, but that ability for inducing nodulation
somehow did not benefit the plants nitrogen economy. Ninety five years later we
learned the reason for that curious discovery when Matthew B. Crook and colleagues
published their revelation that a naturally existing plasmid results in rhizobial strains
which enhance competitiveness for nodule occupancy, but impair nitrogen fixation,
resulting in reduced benefit to the host plant (Crook et al. 2012).
14.20 “The Conquest of Bacteria from 606–693, 2nd edn”
by Sherwood Taylor, 1940
Frank Sherwood Taylor had a Doctorate in History and the Method of Science, and
he wrote interesting books on many different aspects of science. I found a copy of his
book on bacteria (Taylor 1940) in a used bookstore when I was a graduate student.
Taylor presented an informed summary about the history of research into bacterial
disease, the body’s immunologic responses, chemical disinfectants, and also antimicrobial chemotherapy. Taylor’s inspiration for that book may have been his
brothers death from tuberculosis. This book holds particular interest for me because
it describes using antibiosis for controlling infectious disease of humans. The
techniques mentioned were chemotherapy using laboratory-developed synthetic
compounds and also naturally antibiotic compounds
Arsphenamine. originally named Salvarsan, initially was designated “606”
because it was the sixth in the sixth group of compounds synthesized for testing. It
was discovered in 1909 by Paul Ehrlich, Alfred Bertheim, and Sachachiro Hata,
marketed originally in 1910 by Hoechst AG, and was the first truly effective cure for
infections caused by Treponema pallidum. William H. Benton, who was a dear
friend of mine and for a while was my laboratory technician, had been a United
States Air Force Hospital Corpsman. Bill once told me that it was always possible to
identify by x-ray if someone had received buttock injections of Salvarsan for
treatment of syphilis, because the injections left a pattern of metallic dots that looked
like shotgun pellets.
This book also describes Kl730, which later became known as Prontosil, as
discovered by Bayer chemists Josef Klarer, Fritz Mietzsch, and Gerhard Domagk.
The compound Kl730 gave rise to the sulphonamide class of antibiotics. At the time
when that book was written by Taylor, the sulphonamides which still serve us well
were relatively new, as was Sulfanilamide which consists of an aniline derivatized
with a sulfonamide group. Sulfanilamide acts by inhibiting the formation of folic
14 Discovering the Symbiotic Nature of Microbial Life: Summarizing Milestone. . .
237