354 



BIOLOGY: GENERAL AND MEDICAL 



The antitoxic nature of the immune serum is thus 

 referable to the liberated superfluous receptors with 

 which the blood serum of the immunized animal becomes 

 more and more thoroughly charged as the immunization 

 process is pushed to its maximum point. 



A brief consideration of the subject will show that the 

 natural immunity of any animal may depend upon 

 its cells being without haptophile groups, or receptors, 

 with the necessary adaptations to the toxic haptophores, 

 or being without toxophilous receptors by which the 

 actual poisonous combinations can be effected. It also 

 explains acquired immunity through regeneration of the 

 haptophile groups, and the occurrence of the antitoxic 



FIG. 135. 



FIG. 136. 



quality of the blood of the immunized animals through 

 the liberation of the superfluous receptors into the blood. 



The theory is ingeniously modified to explain those 

 different reactions that follow the employment of an 

 antigen consisting of organized bodies. To meet this 

 requirement it is assumed that there is a second order of 

 receptors possessing double affinities, attracting on one 

 hand the molecules useful to the cell, and on the other 

 the enzymic substances by which they may be utilized : 



Such receptors, later detached and circulating in the 

 blood, may be recognized as the amboceptors through 

 whose affinity for the complement on the one hand 

 and for the formed elements of the antigen on the 



