Abstract
Summary
The number of LD50's of C. botulinum type E toxin necessary to produce a toxin-antitoxin precipitin line in the Ouchterlony gel-diffusion test is much greater for trypsin-activated than for non-activated toxin. For the same lethal challenge dose, less antitoxin is needed to protect mice against toxin after trypsinization than before the toxin is activated. Antitoxin units required for animal protection are related to the amount of toxin which is activated rather than to mouse toxicity obtained by trypsinization. The data indicate that tryptic activation of type E toxin results in appearance of more toxic groupings without a concomitant increase in the number of immunologically reactive sites.
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