82 SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



became enormously distended with gas, and the bacillus in question was 

 recovered from the blood and all the organs in pure cultivation. 



Bacillus aerogenes capsulatus in Circulating Blood.* — R. Cole 

 obtained the B. aerogenes capsulatus Welch from the blood of the 

 general circulation of the living patient, both of whose lower limbs had 

 been amputated after a severe crash. The method employed was to 

 withdraw 8 c.cm. of blood from a superficial vein at the bend of the left 

 elbow by means of a sterile syringe, and distributing 7 c.cm. among 

 12 tubes of litmus milk and incubating anaerobically in a Novy's jar. 

 The remaining cubic centimetre was injected intravenously into a rabbit, 

 which was killed after a few minutes and placed in the incubator at 

 87° C. for 24 hours. At the end of this time the animal was distended 

 with gas and subcutaneous emphysema was present. From the heart- 

 •blood of the rabbit and from the liver and spleen the B. aerogenes 

 capsulatus was isolated in pure cultivation ; the litmus tubes also gave 

 a pure cultivation. Some 25 c.cm. of blood were conducted from the arm 

 of the patient (before death) by means of a rubber tube into a basin of 

 water, and the author was able to show that no free gas was present in 

 the circulating blood. 



Bacillus vascularum and gummosis.t — R. Greig-Smith describes a 

 new bacillus isolated from the gummy exudation of the vascular bundles 

 •of sugar-canes affected with gummosis. The organism is an obligate 

 aerobe growing best at 30° C, and not at all at 37° C, averaging 0*4 

 to 1 /u, in length, actively motile, and possessing a single terminal 

 tlagellum. On glucose-gelatin plates the colonies develop slowly as 

 small, raised, viscid, granular drops, which in about 20 days reach a 

 diameter of 4 to 8 mm., and resemble drops of yellow beeswax ; the 

 medium is slowly liquefied. Gelatin-stab shows a filiform growth in the 

 upper part of the puncture, with a hemispherical, yellow, glistening 

 nail-head ; no gas-formation occurs. Glycerin-agar gives a thin, broad, 

 translucent, white, moist, glistening growth, which later deepens to a 

 primrose-yellow, with turbid condensation-water. Milk is unaltered in 

 appearance. Nutrient broth shows a scanty growth, uniformly turbid, 

 and gives a faint indol reaction. The best medium consists of peptone 

 0*5 p.c, saccharose or levulose 5 p.c, potassium phosphate 05 p.c, 

 agar 2 p.c, in tap-water, with its reaction adjusted to correspond to 

 10 c.cm. = 0"14 c.cm. N/10 acid. The organism upon this medium 

 grew well, and produced a slimy material identical in appearance, and 

 by chemical tests, with the gum obtained from the diseased plants, thus 

 confirming the assumption of Cobb, and at the same time completely 

 disproving the statement of Mangin that the gum was produced by the 

 sugar-cane, and that the bacteria lived upon it. 



New Ascobacterium from the Sugar-Cane.J — R. Greig-Smith gives 

 an account of a new organism, Bacterium sacchari, which he found 

 existing as a normal saprophyte of the sugar-cane, and which formed 

 well-defined masses of capsulated bacteria, under certain conditions, 

 when grown upon solid media in the presence of a sugar. The solid 



* Bull. Johns Hopkins Hosp., xiii. (1902) pp. 234-5. 



t Proc. Liiin. Soc. New South Wales, xxvii. (1902) pp. 30-47. 



X Tom. cit , pp. 137-44. 



