BACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS AVIUM 455 



BACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS AVIUM (MAFFUCCI), 

 MIGULA, 1900. 



SYNONYMS: Bacillus tuberculosis avium, Maffucci, 1891; Mycobacter- 

 ium tuberculosis avium, Lehmann and Neumann, 1896. 



From time to time fowls are known to suffer from a form 

 of tuberculosis that in a number of ways suggests human 

 or mammalian tuberculosis. The bacillus causing the disease, 

 the so-called bacillus of fowl tuberculosis, bacillus tuber- 

 culosis avium, while simulating the genuine bacillus tuber- 

 culosis morphologically, differs from it both in cultural 

 and pathogenic peculiarities. Thus, for instance, it develops 

 into much longer and somewhat thinner threads; grows 

 rapidly on media without glycerin or glucose; does not 

 grow on potato; develops as well at from 42 to 43 C. as 

 at 37 to 38 C.; 1 its virulence is not diminished by cul- 

 tivation at 43 C.; development on artificial media begins 

 in from six to eight days after inoculation; young cultures 

 on solid media are whitish, soft, and moist, becoming yel- 

 lowish and slimy with age; it is somewhat more resistant 

 to drying and high temperatures than the bacillus of mam- 

 malian tuberculosis; the results of its pathogenic activities 

 are almost always chronic, are rarely located in the lungs 

 or intestines, but are especially frequent in the liver and 

 spleen; the lesions are conspicuously rich in bacteria, do 

 not show the central necrotic area that characterize the 

 mammalian tubercle; the disease is transmissible from the 

 hen to the embryo chick; the only susceptible mammal is 

 the rabbit; the guinea-pig and dog are naturally immune; 

 it has the same micro-chemical staining reactions as mam- 



1 The normal body-temperature of fowls ranges between 41.5 and 

 42.5 C. 



