376 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 19 63 



Western readers should be informed that Russian and American 

 taxonomists of Actinomycetes have enjoyed excellent relationships. 

 For example, immediately on announcement of a committee in the 

 United States to study actinomycete classification, G. F. Gauze, of 

 the Institute for the Study of New Antibiotics of the Academy of 

 Medical Sciences of the USSR, made available for English trans- 

 lation his monograph, Problems in the Classification of Antagonistic 

 Actinomycetes, which was just going to press in Russia. Through 

 Dr. Gauze's personal assistance the English version was published 

 promptly. He and several colleagues have paid visits to the United 

 States in recent years, and have shown a lively and friendly interest 

 in the mutual exchange of scientific data. 



The Actinomycetes have been under investigation in the Department 

 of Botany at the University of Michigan since 1938. One of the more 

 significant and unexpected findings was that normal filaments of 

 Streptomyces^ freshly isolated from nature, may carry a temperate 

 virus. Dr. Elwood Shirling, now professor of the Department of 

 Botany at Ohio Wesleyan University, made this discovery. The 

 viruses and the Streptomycetes are in harmonious relationship. Only 

 when there is disharmony is the presence of the virus evident. Then 

 the filaments dissolve and a mass of free infectious virus particles is 

 released. It has been confirmed that temperate viruses are commonly 

 present in normal filaments of Streptomyces. There is practical con- 

 cern to alter Streptomycetes favorably by inoculation with foreign, 

 temperate viruses. Theoretically, we should like to know how the 

 viral genes intercalate into the inheritance mechanism of the filament. 



In quite another branch of science and technology from those we 

 have been considering, botanists serve medicine, agriculture, and for- 

 estry. As we mentioned in the introductory paragraph of this article, 

 the causal organisms of disease may be members of the plant kingdom, 

 notably the fungi. Botanists are employed in isolating, identifying, 

 classifying, and establishing the life histories of the myriad of fungi 

 that parasitize man, animals, crop plants, and forest trees. There 

 is a lively demand for medical mycologists, as fungiis infections, in- 

 cluding the deep ones which are lethal, have been considerably on 

 the increase during the past 15 years, whereas those attributable to 

 bacteria have declined. Actually, the reported increase of fungus 

 diseases may reflect improved diagnostic measures, as well as the fact 

 that people are living to be older and the physiologically senescent 

 are probably more prone to fungus infection. 



Since 195Y relief against deep fungus infections has come through 

 treatment with a new antibiotic. Amphotericin B, derived from Strep- 

 tomyces nodosus and developed by Squibbs as "Fungizone" and "My- 

 steclin F." It has been used quite successfully, administered with 

 tetracycline, by an intravenous drip method. 



