New Media for the Growth of Bartonella bacilliformis.

Abstract

Liquid, semi-solid and solid media, tissue cultures, and developing chick embryos have been utilized for the growth of Bartonella bacilliformis. 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 Of these media, the semi-solid leptospira medium of Noguchi and nutrient blood agar have aided (1) in proving B. bacilliformis as the etiological agent of Oroya fever and verruga peruana, the two entities of Carrion's disease in Peru, (2) animal experimentation, (3) studies on transmission, and (4) limited immunological studies with the organism. Further progress, particularly with the biochemical characteristics of the organism and the immunology of the disease, has been handicapped by the slowness and relatively sparse growth of bartonella in leptospira medium, and the difficulty of making suspensions with organisms when grown on blood agar. Thus, it was believed that the development of methods for cultivating greater quantities of the organisms would stimulate attempts to solve some of the current problems of bartonellosis.

A fruitful approach to the problem of improving known media and devising new ones, appeared to be linked with the need in leptospira medium for serum and particularly a solution of hemoglobin from laked red blood corpuscles. The necessity for these ingredients indicated that certain vitamins and growth-promoting factors found in the cellular elements of the blood might be the key substances needed for growth.∗ Furthermore, B. bacilliformis in Oroya fever invades and multiplies within cells of the reticulo-endothelial system, 4 a fact which suggested the possible advantageous use of ingredients in monocyte media 6 , 7 for enhancing the growth of bartonella.

Extensive experiments with protein digests; blood, yeast, and liver extracts; peptones; vitamins and developing chick embryos have yielded numerous new media that surpass the results obtainable with leptospira medium and blood agar.