106 The Nature of Precipitin Reactions 



from the same animal, viz., saliva, albuminous urine, spermatic secretion, 

 milk serum, muscle-extract. Moreover, blood serum was found to be 

 precipitated by lactoserum, as well as by antiserum for albuminous urine. 

 Repeating the experiment of Nolf (cited above, see p. 104) they obtained 

 a contrary result. Antiserum produced by globulin injections acted not 

 only on globulin but also on solutions of serum-albumin. Moreover they 

 found antiserum for serum-albumin to precipitate serum-albumin, and 

 also globulin. To make sure that this was not due to impurity of the 

 serum-albumin, which might contain globulin, they prepared as pure a 

 substance as was possible (see method in original, p. 370), but obtained 

 an identical result. They conclude that anti-globulin acts most on 

 globulin solutions, less on those of albumin. The antiserum for albumin 

 on the other hand actually produced more reaction with globulin solu- 

 tions than with its homologous substance. They conclude that for the 

 present the precipitins do not permit us to demonstrate chemical 

 differences between the different albumins of one animal. Strube 

 (12, vi. 1902) injected rabbits intraperitoneally with human spermatozoa 

 and human testicular extract (from cadaver), obtaining in both cases 

 a weak antiserum which acted on spermatozoa solutions. Anti-human 

 haematoserum had however the same effect, quantitatively and quali- 

 tatively, on spermatozoa solutions, and vice versa. Meyer and Aschoff 

 (7, VH. 1902) found that injections of blood, spermatozoa, and tracheal 

 epithelium led to the formation of antisera which coagulated milk 

 solutions (1 : 40). 



Obermayer and Pick (1902) studied the different constituents of 

 egg-white, finding the albumin to contain : a globulin, crystallizable 

 albumin, a non-crystallizable albumin-constituent (conalbumin), and 

 ovimucoid, also other bodies upon which they will report later. The 

 egg-globulin of other authors they claim to have separated into four 

 different constituents : ovimucin, dysglobulin (both insoluble in water), 

 euglobulin and pseudoglobulin (both soluble in water). These bodies, 

 purified by washing, were injected severally into rabbits and the various 

 antisera tested upon the different constituents of egg-white. Re- 

 peatedly crystallized egg-albumin (method of Hoffmeister) did not lead 

 to the formation of antiserum. The result of the tests was that all the 

 constituents of egg-white gave a precipitum, proving that the antisera 

 were not specific for the different constituents. They were surprised to 

 find that a substance might not lead to the formation of a precipitin 

 which acted upon that substance, but to a precipitin which acted on 

 some other body in egg-albumin. 



