July 23, 1909] 



SCIENCE 



101 



Dr. Abel, professor of pharmacology in the 

 Johns Hopkins University, collected in 

 New York state, and then again in New 

 Hampshire. We have thus had a consid- 

 erable amount of material for study, gath- 

 ered from widely separated areas. 



During the first M'inter's work'" I was 

 able to confirm Kobert's assertions as to 

 the presence of a powerful hemolj'sin in 

 Amanita phalloides. I found it acted 

 upon blood corpuscles from nearly every 

 animal tested, and that it corresponded 

 somewhat in its action to hemolysins de- 

 rived from bacterial filtrates. At the same 

 time it was at once apparent that 

 this fungus always contained another 

 poison which differed from the hemoly- 

 sin in being resistant to heat and diges- 

 tion, the blood-laking substance phallin, 

 being destroyed by heating to 70° C, 

 and by the action of the digestive fer- 

 ments. To this second substance I gave 

 the name amanita-toxin" reserving for 

 the blood-laking principle the name aman- 

 ita-hemolysin, in order to clearly differ- 

 entiate between these poisons, regardless 

 of any question as to the active principle. 

 The work was now taken up from the 

 chemical standpoint and under Dr. Abel's 

 direction a number of important problems 

 have been solved. In the first place he 

 and I'^ have shown that aqueous extracts 

 of Amanita phalloides contain two poisons 

 which may be separated by concentration 

 to a small bulk and precipitation by ethyl 

 alcohol. The precipitate contains the 

 amanita-hemolysin, the filtrate the ama- 

 nita-toxin. This hemolytic substance we 

 have shown to be not a toxalbumin, as 



" Ford, The Journal of Infectious Diseases, Vol. 

 III., No. 2, April, 1906, pp. 191-224. 



" Ford, The Journal of Experimental Medicine, 

 Vol. VIII., No. 3, May 20, 1906, pp. 437-450. 



"Abel and Ford, The Jour, of Biol. Chem., 

 Vol. II., No. 4, January, 1907, p. 273. 



Kobert believes, but a very sensitive glu- 

 coside, that is, a substance which contains 

 sugar in its molecule, and which when split 

 up into its component parts will give the 

 most important reactions for sugar, 

 namely, the reduction of Fehling's solu- 

 tion and ammoniacal silver nitrate. 

 Furthermore we'" have developed a 

 method for the isolation and purification 

 of this substance, and have finally been 

 able to show that it is an extremely com- 

 plicated poison containing fixed amounts 

 of carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen and sul- 

 phur. The importance of these observa- 

 tions lies not only in the practical appli- 

 cation of the method we have developed to 

 the examination of other fungi, but also 

 in certain theoretical questions of immu- 

 nity. This substance is the poison in 

 Amanita phalloides to which a high grade 

 of immunity can be established in animals 

 and for which I have repeatedly obtained 

 an anti-poison or an anti-hemolysin, the 

 action of which is to completely neutralize 

 its blood-laking properties. 



Schlesinger and 1-° at the same time 

 have shown that the amanita-toxin can be 

 isolated and purified by certain well-de- 

 fined methods, and in its pure state is one 

 of the most powerful poisons of organic 

 origin known, four tenths of one milligram 

 killing a guinea-pig within twenty-four 

 hours. At first thought to be a conjugate 

 sulphate, I have recently foiind, in associa- 

 tion with Mr. Prouty, that conjugate sul- 

 phate can not be split off from the amanita- 

 toxin. The exact character of this poison 

 is still under investigation. These two 

 substances, the amanita-hemolysin and the 

 amanita-toxin, are the only poisons we have 

 thus far encountered in Amanita phal- 



" Abel and Ford, Arch. f. exp. Path, et Pharm., 

 Supplement-Band, Sehniiedeberg Festschrift, 1908. 



^ Schlesinger and Ford, Jour, of Biol. Chem., 

 Vol. III., No. 4, September, 1907, p. 279. 



