Abstract
Agents such as ionizing radiations, mustard gas, etc., effective in increasing mutation-rates in higher organisms, have been shown1 to act likewise in micro-organisms, including several species of bacteria. We can now add a strain of Bacterium aerogenes (isolate by one of us—C. H.—from dried milk) to the list of bacteria in which mutations have been induced by X-ray treatment: doses of 35,000 to 50,000 r., which leave 10−3 to 10−4 survivors, yield ‘biochemical’ mutants at rates of up to 1 per cent.
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References
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Cf. the situation in Paramecium: Sonneborn, T. M., "Advances in Genetics", 1, 263, 358 (1947).
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DEVI, P., PONTECORVO, G. & HIGGINBOTTOM, C. X-Ray Induced Mutations in Dried Bacteria. Nature 160, 503–504 (1947). https://doi.org/10.1038/160503b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/160503b0
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