112 BACTERIAL ASSOCIATIONS 



strains from carrier cases were more active against stock cultures of B. typhosus than 

 were stock cultures of B. coli. Unfortunately, he did not test the B. typhosus from the 

 carrier with its own B. coli, but the evidence suggested an inhibition because of the 

 difficulty he had in obtaining the B. typhosus in these cases. Vignati' described the 

 reverse phenomenon in which fresh, actively growing cultures of B. typhosus inhibited 

 the growth of B. coli, older cultures not being antagonistic. He explained the facts on 

 Bail's theory of the spatial needs of each bacterium. Lisbonne and Carrere,^ by a 

 method suggesting that of Schiller,^ forced a bacteriophage to develop by the antag- 

 onistic action of B. coli against the Shiga bacillus. They found at the end of a series 

 of passages that an active and transmissible lytic principle was developed by what 

 they call a "vitiation" in the metabolism of the Shiga bacillus. B. proteus X19 gave 

 identical results. They considered that this is what occurs in the intestines where an-' 

 tagonistic conditions are always present. They later showed that this principle was 

 not carried by the B. coli since the same strain was tested by Beckerich and Hauduroy 

 who suggested such an explanation, and was not found to be lysogenic. It was def- 

 initely the result of microbial interactions. Fabry also obtained a principle of the 

 same kind through the antagonistic stimulus of a Staphylococcus albus on B. coli which 

 also acted on the Shiga bacillus. Bordet^ reported a similar discovery with four pri- 

 marily non-lytic strains of B. coli in which the lytic principle appeared spontaneously 

 and was increased by passage. Gratia^ studied an example of antagonism between 

 two races of B. coli as Nissle^ had shown from another point of view. Filtrates of B. 

 coli V. inhibited B. coli and caused an agglutinative culture of the latter in fluid 

 media. The same results were obtained with living cultures on agar, and in both 

 cases the secondary colonies were resistant to the action of B. coli V, It resembled 

 the Gratia principle but was not regenerated by the B. coli 0, being lost by the third 

 passage, and did not act in high dilutions as bacteriophage does. On agar plates the 

 area about the growth of B. coli V. was inhibitive to the growth of B. coli 4> but not to 

 B. coli V, It was therefore not a vaccination of the medium. It was very resistant 

 to storage, chloroform, and high temperatures (100° C, for thirty minutes). Bordet*^ 

 has carefully analyzed the various interactions between the bacteria giving the re- 

 sults that Lisbonne and Carrere' reported, but as this is encroaching on the problem 

 of bacteriophage which is to be presented elsewhere'" in this book, I need go no further. 



THE THEOBALD AND D. E. SMITH PHENOMENON 



A most interesting example of the inhibitory effect of bacteria in association was 

 reported in 1920 by Theobald Smith and D. E. Smith." They found that B. para- 

 ■ Vignati, J.: Compt. rend. Soc. de bioL, 94, 209. 1926. 



* Lisbonne, M., and Carrere, L.: ibid., 86, 569. 1922; 87, ion. 1922; 90, 265. 1924. 

 3 Schiller, I.: loc. cit. 



■» Fabry, P.: ibid., 87, 369. 1922; 90, 109. 1924. 

 sBordet, J.: ibid., go, g6. 1924. 



* Gratia, A.: ibid., 93, 1040. 1925. ' Nissle, R.: loc. cit. 



* Bordet, J.: Com pi. rend. Soc. dc bioL, 93, 1054. 1925. 

 'Lisbonne, M., and Carrere, L.: loc. cit. 



'"Chapter xl. " Smith, T., and D. E.: /. General Physiol., 3, 21. 1920. 



