STUDIES OF HEMOLYTIC STAPHYLOCOCCI 



HEMOLYTIC ACTIVITY BIOCHEMICAL REACTIONS SEROLOGIC REACTIONS 



LOUIS A. JULIANELLE 



From the Bacteriological Laboratories of the School of Hygiene, University of Pennsylvania 

 and the Philadelphia General Hospital, Philadelphia 



I. STUDY OF HEMOLYTIC ACTIVITY 



That staphylococci lake blood was brought out in 1900, when Kraus * noticed 

 the hemolytic effect of staphylococci on bloodplates. The following year Neisser 

 and Wechsberg 2 demonstrated a hemolytic substance in nitrates of broth cul- 

 tures. They found that in alkaline beef broth, this hemolytic substance began 

 to appear on the fourth day and reached a maximum between the eighth and 

 fourteenth day. In a general way they showed that aureus and virulent 

 strains produced greater quantities of hemolysins than did either the albus 

 or avirulent strains. Van durme 3 found that the hemolytic power was gen- 

 erally greatest in cultures freshly isolated from pathologic conditions, and 

 was generally absent in cultures from dust and from the normal mouth. Todd, 4 

 working with B. megatherium and Kraus B working with staphylococcus showed 

 that this action takes place in vivo as well as in vitro. 



PRODUCTION OF HEMOLYSIN 



It had been observed that in a general way staphylococci would show 

 hemolysis to a greater or less extent on blood-agar plates within 24 

 hours. In addition, the hemolysis was not typical of an exogenous 

 hemolysin, as is typical of Streptococcus hemolyticus; but rather 

 resembled an exogenous product of metabolism, as in the case of B. coli, 

 where the hemolysis diffuses haphazardly through the medium. 



The first experiment was made to determine what analogy there was 

 in chronicity in the production of hemolysins on blood plates and in 

 broth. It might be stated here that all the work on hemolytic activity was 

 obtained with 4 cultures representative of all the strains studied. Two 

 were known hemolytic, and 2 were originally isolated as nonhemolytic. 

 Twenty-four hour cultures were seeded into 10% horse (inactivated) 

 serum broth in Erlenmeyer flasks and incubated at 37 C. for 24 hours. 

 At the end of each 24-hour period, 5 c c of the culture were removed 



Received for publication, May 22, 1922. 



1 Wien. Klin. Wchnschr., 1900, 13, p. 49. 



2 Ztschr. f. Hyg. u. Infektionskr., 1901, 36, p. 299. 



3 Hyg. Rundschau, 1903, 13, p. 66. 



4 Trans. London Path. Soc., 1902, 53, p. 196. 

 B Wien. klin. Wchnschr., 1902, 15, p. 382. 



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