Identification of Aminobenzoic Acids in Relation to Bacterial Metabolism

Abstract

THE problem of the chemical identification of p-aminobenzoic acid has become important in view of its well-known action as antagonist of sulphonamides and the theory of Fildes and Woods concerning the mode of action of sulphonamides. Microbiological methods will always leave some doubt as to specificity, and the frequently used diazotization methods (suggested, for example, for estimation of p-aminobenzoic acid by Eckert¹) are known to be unspecific and will be shown to give misleading results. So far, the presence of p-aminobenzoic acid has been established only for yeast^2,3 by methods requiring large amounts of material.