Disinfectants cell wall lysis

This structure is the traditional target for a group of antibiotics which include the penicillins (Chapter 5), but a httle-noticed report which appeared in 1948 showed that low concentrations of disinfectant snbstances cansed cell wall lysis such that a normally tuibid suspension of bacteria became clear. It was thought that these low concentrations of disinfectant cause en mes whose normal role is to synthesize the cell wall to reverse their role in some way and effect its dismption or lysis. 

Chlorinated derivatives of phenols, cresol, and xylenol elicit the release of [ C]-glutamate from E. colt [92]. These compounds are effective bactericides and are used in crude disinfectant and antiseptic preparations such as LysoT and Det-tol . Their abUity to denature protein is probably responsible for their disruptive action upon microbial cell membranes. In addition to damaging the membrane [92], phenol exerts a lytic action upon the cell wall lysis occurs in growing cultures of E. coll [93] and is particularly noted in synchronous cultures at the point of cell division [94]. 

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