SPIRAL BODIES IN BACTERIAL CULTURES 375 



non-motility and reaction towards stains differentiated them 

 definitely from true spiroclietes and their presence, in cultures of 

 motile organisms only, suggested a relationship with the flagella. 

 Further, their regular absence from preparations stained after 

 Johnston and Mack would seem to prove that they were lifeless. 



DISCUSSION 



Since this phenomenon has been most frequently seen during the 

 investigation of anaei^obes, it has been thought that anaerobiosis 

 and the formation of spiral bodies were in some way connected. 

 It is now evident, however, that they are formed in aerobic cul- 

 tures. We have found them exclusively in the condensation 

 water of such cultures and in its rapid drying out may rest the 

 explanation of their having been so frequently missed. Sakharoff 

 (1893) when studying an aerobe, found them in hanging drops of 

 the liquefied gelatin and there as in Bacillus mesentericus-vulgatus 

 a stout pelhcle had grown over the surface of the liquid. It may 

 be said that under such a pellicle anaerobic conditions exist, but 

 spiral bodies were found in the condensation water of Bacillus 

 cereus and Bacillus mesentericus-fuscus after the third day, when 

 no pellicles had formed. Also, both LoefHer (1890) and Moore 



(1893) found them in stained preparations of the typhoid bacillus 

 made from cultures which they do not say were grown anaerob- 

 ically. Koga and Otsubo (1919) found them in cultures of a 

 number of bacilli but all were cultivated anaerobically. They 

 further claim to have found flagella on Pfeifferella mallei and 

 spiral bodies in their anaerobic cultures of this form. 



In the earliest references no emphasis was laid on the nature 

 of the media on which the organisms were cultivated. Novy 



(1894) was the first to suggest a relationship between the media 

 and the formation of spiral bodies. Our findings agree with his 

 in that spiral bodies were most abundant in the condensation 

 water of cultures grown on agar slants and were very rare or 

 entirely absent in bouillon cultures. We have not used gelatin. 

 Koga and Otsubo (1919) state that spiral bodies did not develop 

 at all in media lacking fresh protein and were never found, when 



