Abstract
It was previously noted 1 that emulsions of guinea pig kidney removed sheep cell agglutinins from the sera of infectious mononucleosis patients slowly and in some cases incompletely even after 3 successive adsorptions with relatively large amounts of tissue. Since ordinarily guinea pig kidney containing heterophile antigen possesses marked affinity for heterophile antibodies it was decided to reinvestigate the antigenic relationship of guinea pig kidney to the sheep cell antibodies occurring in the blood of individuals with infectious mononucleosis.
In the previous work, to conserve material, finely ground emulsions of tissue prepared for immunization purposes were used for adsorption and as the number of successive adsorptions increased with any one serum the turbidity of the supernatant fluid increased considerably. Under these conditions it is possible that the physical properties of the serum, viscosity, surface tension, etc., were so altered that the sheep cells used in the test after adsorption were unable to fix the homologous agglutinins or having fixed the agglutinins were unable to agglutinate in the characteristic manner.
Throughout the work herein reported guinea pig kidney tissue was lightly ground in a mortar, the macerate strained through a coarse fabric and the material passing the cloth washed by centrifugation until the supernatant fluid showed only a slight opalescence. Five infectious mononucleosis sera have been absorbed with such tissue emulsions in the following way: To 2 cc. of a 1:2.5 dilution of the serum were added 0.5 cc. of the tissue emulsion. The tubes were shaken and placed at 37.5°C. for 30 minutes. The tubes were then centrifuged, a portion of the supernatant fluid tested with sheep cells for both agglutinins and lysins (lowest dilution 1:10). Fresh tissue was added to the remainder and the procedure repeated until 3 adsorptions were completed.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.