Mutations occur spontaneously in bacteria as they do in higher organisms, animal and plant. It is possible, at least in certain cases, to increase the frequency of these mutations by various physical agents (X-rays, etc.) or by chemical ones. In plants and animals it has not yet been possible to “direct” the process of mutation, that is, to produce from a given genotype another genotype, determined in advance. This, however, can be achieved with bacteria. In a few favorable cases it has been possible to transform an antigenic type of pneumococcus into another type of pneumococcus fixed in advance, or an antigenic type of colon bacillus into another type of colon bacillus, also fixed in advance, by utilizing an inducing principle of a desoxyribonucleic nature, chemically isolated from the bacterium whose genotype is desired.
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A. Boivin (1947) studied this question.