BA CTERIOL YSINS A ND HMMOL YSINS 1 1 1 



The Development of the Bordet-Gengou Phe- 

 nomenon by Wassermann and others. Wasser- 

 mann and Bruck 1 experimenting with the Bordet- 

 Gengou phenomenon sought to apply the reaction 

 to the diagnosis of tuberculosis, and instead of using 

 a suspension of tubercle bacilli as antigen, they 

 employed the various tuberculin preparations. The 

 fact that they achieved a small measure of success 

 with the tuberculin, which is an extract of the tuber- 

 cle bacillus, led them to try the extracts of various 

 other organisms in the diagnosis of the correspond- 

 ing diseases. At this time, experiments were being 

 conducted on the transmission of syphilis to monkeys 

 and Wassermann used the blood of these monkeys 

 in his experiments. Inasmuch as the spirochaeta 

 pallida had not yet been grown in pure culture it 

 occurred to these workers to use as an antigen an 

 extract made from the liver of a syphilitic foetus, 

 for the reason 'that this organ contained large num- 

 bers of spirochaetes. The reaction took place with 

 marked regularity with these reagents and was 

 fairly specific. It was, therefore, thought that they 

 were dealing with a combination which took place 

 between the spirochaetal extract and the antibodies 

 which this organism called forth. Within a short 

 time, however, much doubt as to the value of the 

 reaction arose when Landsteiner, Miiller and Potzl 2 



1 Med. Klinik, Vol. Iv, 1905. 



2 Wien. Kl. Woch., Vol. xx, 1907. 



