An Attempted Theory of Photosynthesis

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Abstract
An attempt is made to explain quantitatively many observations described in the literature on the photosynthetic production of oxygen in its dependence on light intensity, time of irradiation, etc. Four photochemical steps and two dark reactions are assumed, in which among others, a peracid, formic acid and a peraldehyde occur. These are the same intermediate compounds as in auto‐oxydation processes, so that the similarity between these two inverse processes is striking. Light saturation is explained by back chain reactions initiated by photolytical decomposition of the per‐compounds. The agreement between observations and calculations is good. The picture gained for the photosynthesis of CO2 can be applied in the same way for that of plant acids but the plant acids can also be photooxidized in a reaction sensitized by chlorophyll.

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