Oxygen uptake of washed suspensions of C. diphtheriæ in the presence of glucose and glycogen

Corynebacterium Diphtheriae

“…From the foregoing, one must conclude that the different colony forms of the diphtherial organism can not be differentiated definitely by qualitative differences in the usual fermentation tests. The clinching evidence for this decision would be metabolic studies with suspensions of the bacterial cells, and so far as the author is aware the only metabolic studies planned to clarify this point have been those of Passmore (1938) and Knox and Passmore (1938). The latter workers found that there is no significant difference between the oxygen consumptions per hour per mg. dry weight of bacterial suspensions of types mitis and gravis when employing glucose or glycogen as the substrate.…”

“…Since the type gravis usually ferments glycogen in the test tube and type mitis does not, Knox and Passmore (1938) reasoned that the fermentation of glycogen might be the explanation for the greater virulence of type gravis within the human body.…”