Based on an unfinished paper by Prof. L.W.J. Holleman;
Translated and completed with criticism by David Cuthbertson.
We can state as an indisputable axiom that under all conditions, artificial or natural, nothing is created; an equal quantity of matter exists before and after the experiment and nothing occurs outside the changes and modifications in the combinations of the elements.
Lavoisier (1789)
Professor Holleman reviewed evidence which suggests that Lavoisier’s law does not always hold true for plants and animals. However, he also showed that none of this evidence is good enough to be considered as definitive, either for or against his belief in the biological transmutation of chemical elements. His own experiments, showing the disappearance and subsequent reappearance of the chemical element potassium in closed cultures of the green alga Chlorella, have therefore been presented in detail to help and encourage others who may wish to conduct further such research.