45 6 Proceedings Columbia Biochemical Association [April-July 



The complete records of our cases will be published elsewhere. 

 The general conclusions only are given here: The serum reaction 

 with Besredka antigen seems specific. This reaction appears early 

 in tuberculosis, yet disappears in the later stages of the disease. 

 So far as the material on hand is concerned, it seems that either 

 Syphilis, as such, or anti-syphilitic treatment markedly lowers the re- 

 sistance of the patients against tubercular infection. As to other 

 diseases their co-existence with tuberculosis, as indicated by this reac- 

 tion, does not seem to be frequent in any condition. In order to 

 avoid any possible non-specific lipotropic reaction we propose to de- 

 lipinize the antigen, which contains tgg yolk. With regard to the 

 cases that gave both reactions, we invariably found the two reac- 

 tions to occur independently. 



I take special pleasure in expressing our indebtedness to Prof. A. 

 Besredka, whose kindness in placing the antigen in our hands made 

 the studies possible. 



121. The value of a new skin test for the diagnosis of 

 tuberculosis. Jacob Bronfenbrenner. {Pathological and Re- 

 search Laboratories of the Western Pennsylvania Hospital, Pitts- 

 hiirgh, Pa.) In my work of last year" it was shown that tuber- 

 culous guinea pigs acquire the power of reducing the number of tu- 

 ber cle bacilli injected into the peritoneal cavity — that certain fixed 

 cells of the peritoneal cavity were apparently responsible for this 

 phenomenon, as the isolated peritoneal tissues of tuberculous ani- 

 mals, when removed from the body of the guinea pig, had the power 

 of reducing the number of tubercle bacilli placed in contact with 

 them. So far as our experiments showed, however, the intraperi- 

 toneal destruction of tubercle bacilli in tuberculous animals was not 

 caused by circulating antibody. 



It was considered desirable to determine the changes in the 

 blood of such guinea pigs under the conditions of the tests, as it 

 seemed improbable that the cells of the peritoneal cavity could have 

 acquired immune properties without these being present in the blood. 



'■Manwaring and Bronfenbrenner: Jour. Exp. Med., 1913, xviii, p. 601. 



