Abstract
Recent observations by Aycock and Kramer 1 and by Shaughnessy, Harmon and Gordon 2 on the incidence of normal persons possessing poliomyelitis antibodies in their blood serum are of considerable interest not only from the standpoint of the epidemiology of this disease, but also from that of its serum therapy. The observations of Shaughnessy and his associates indicate that the titer of these antibodies in the serum of certain “normal” adults may not only equal, but appreciably exceed that of the average poliomyelitis convalescent. These important observations have prompted us to make a similar survey in this region.
The Aycock strain of the virus is being used in our studies. This strain produces poliomyelitis in rhesus monkeys with great regularity, the first symptoms of the disease appearing generally between the 5th and 8th day. Pieces of cord and medulla were weighed and very finely ground in a motorized mortar 3 in the presence of sterile ground pyrex glass. Enough neutral physiological saline solution was then added to this ground material to make a 5% suspension of the virus-tissue. After light centrifugation for 10 minutes and filtration through sterile filter paper this suspension was distributed in 1 cc. quantities to a series of serological tubes containing equivalent volumes of the various sera (or serum dilutions) to be tested. In the first series of tests these serum-virus mixtures were incubated at 37°C. for 2 hours. In the second series no incubation preceded the injection of the serum-virus mixtures. The various serum-virus mixtures were injected into the frontal lobe of the brain of M. rhesus monkeys in doses of 1.5 cc. Monkeys which were protected against injection by a given serum dilution were again used in testing the same serum in the next higher dilution 15 to 20 days later.
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