Recognition of Plant Rac:tiirioloc.y in Turopf. 371 



UndcT these circumstances it is important to turn to tlie examination of 

 fresh material and to make attempts to cuhivate parasitic organisms, pro- 

 videci such exist in cancer and other malignant tumors. This direction of 

 study has therefore been followed in recent years by several investigators, 

 and it is especially his results along these lines which Dr. Gaylord has 

 reported to us this evening. 



Dr. Welch welcomed studies which shed light on " cellular 

 degenerations and metamorphoses " in cancer. Until, he said, 

 " we are in possession of more evidence than has yet been fur- 

 nished in favor of the parasitic hypothesis " of the origin of 

 cancer, research wofkers would have to be prepared for much 

 skepticism following the announcements of their results. He 

 recognized that, as yet, there was 



not much agreement among the different observers either in the description 

 or the interpretation of the various bodies regarded by them as parasites 

 to be seen in fresh cancerous material or fluids, or in such material kept 

 free from bacterial contamination, whether mixed wMth some cultural fluid 

 or not. Dr. Gaylord lays especial emphasis upon the presence in cancers 

 and other conditions of homogeneous, yellowish, spherical bodies resem- 

 bling droplets of fat but without the usual reactions for fat, and he 

 considers that he finds evidences of multiplication of these bodies and of 

 their passing through a definite cycle of development which he describes. 



Of Dr. Gaylord's experimental results in reproducing malignant 

 tumors. Dr. Welch concluded: " Dr. Gaylord has presented an 

 instance of multiple nodules in the lungs of an adeno-carcino- 

 matous nature following the intravenous injection of cancerous 

 ascitic fluid. With this exception and one or two more doubtful 

 cases, his experimental results . . . are, like those of other inves- 

 tigators in the same line, negative." 



Nevertheless, when Welch read Nawaschin's article describing 

 Plasmodiophora brasskae, he forwarded it to Gaylord and must 

 have suggested that, in view of the similarity between the parasitic 

 organism which " produces tumor-like formations in cabbages " 

 and "" the bodies w^hich [Gaylord had] found in epithelium in 

 carcinoma," vegetable material might be obtained from Smith to 

 study the parasitic aspect of the question. 



Welch urged thorough "microscopic examination of fresh, 

 macerated, and preserved cancerous material. ... As regards 

 artificial cultures," he also said. 



