CHAPTER VIII 



ANTIGENIC PROPERTIES 



Early studies on the antigenic properties of bacteriophages 

 have been reviewed by d'Herelle (1926) and Burnet, Keogh, 

 and Lush (1937). The latter reference gives an excellent dis- 

 cussion of the mechanism of the antigen-antibody reaction 

 from the kinetic viewpoint and, in addition, contains much 

 experimental material which has not been published elsewhere. 



Bordet and Ciuca (1921) first demonstrated that injection of 

 rabbits with phage lysates stimulates the production of phage- 

 neutralizing antibody. Their antisera also contained aggluti- 

 nins for the host bacterium. The injection of host bacteria, 

 however, failed to stimulate the production of phage-neutraliz- 

 ing antibody. Otto and Winkler (1922) were able to remove 

 all bacterial agglutinins by absorption with host bacteria with- 

 out affecting the antiphage properties of the serum. These 

 findings demonstrated that phage is antigenically distinct from 

 its host. 



It was early recognized that antiphage sera had considerable 

 specificity, inactivating the homologous and some heterologous 

 strains of phage but not others. The fact that serological re- 

 lationship was correlated with other properties of bacterio- 

 phages was not generally appreciated, however, until the taxo- 

 nomic work of Burnet and Asheshov. 



Since these early experiments it has been found that the ac- 

 tivity of antiphage antibodies is not confined to neutralization. 

 The addition of a suflSciently concentrated suspension of phage 

 particles to homologous antiserum results in visible aggregation 

 of the virus particles followed by settling of the clumps as a 

 precipitate. By suitable ultrafiltration methods one can sep- 



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