462 Whooping-cough 



At first the growth is scant, but upon transplantation grows better 

 and better, until finally it may be made to grow upon other media, 

 such as blood-agar, ascitic agar, or broth to which blood or ascitic 

 fluid has been added. The organism is a strict aerobe. It grows 

 best at 37°C., but also grows at temperatures as low as 5° to io°C. 

 On appropriate culture-media WoUstein found it might remain alive 

 for two months. 



Metabolic Products. — The organism is incapable of producing 

 either acids or gases from carbohydrates. It produces no indol and 

 has no recognized enzymes.- An endotoxin was found by Bordet and 

 Gengou, the method of preparing which was improved by Besredka* 

 as follows: The growth upon agar-agar is removed with a small 

 quantity of salt solution, dried in vacuo, and ground m a mortar 

 with a small measured quantity of salt. Enough distilled water is 

 then added to make a 0.75 per cent, solution, after which the mixture 

 is centrifugalized and decanted. Of this preparation i to 2 cc. usu- 

 ally killed a rabbit about twenty-four hours after intravenous injec- 

 tion. Subcutaneous injection caused a necrosis without suppuration 

 and without constitutional symptoms. Small quantities of the toxin 

 placed in the rabbit's eye caused local necrosis with little inflam- 

 matory reaction. The introduction of dead or hving cultures into 

 the peritoneal cavity of guinea-pigs caused death with great effusion 

 and hemorrhage in the peritoneal tissues. 



Pathogenesis. — Inoculation of monkeys with cultures of the ba- 

 cillus failed to produce the disease. Klimenko, f however, succeeded 

 in infecting monkeys and pups by intratracheal introduction of 

 pure cultures. After a period of incubation an illness came on, the 

 most marked symptoms being pyrexia and pulmonary irritation. 

 After two or three weeks the dogs died. Postmortem examination 

 showed catarrh of the respiratory tissues with patches of broncho- 

 pneumonia. Healthy dogs contracted the disease by contact with 

 those suffering from the infection. FrankelJ obtained similar results. 



The differences between the Bordet-Gengou bacillus and the in- 

 fluenza bacillus are not great. In size, mode of occurrence, grouping 

 and staining there is much resemblance between the two. Cultur- 

 ally, however, they differ because the influenza bacillus grows best 

 upon hemoglobin or blood agar-agar, which is less adapted for the 

 isolation of the Bordet-Gengou bacillus than the culture-medjum 

 recommended above, upon which the influenza bacillus does not 

 grow well. Further, we have as differential features the peculiar 

 endotoxin of the Bordet-Gengou bacillus, the successful infection 

 of dogs and monkeys with the disease resembling whooping-cough, 

 and the transmission of this infection from animal to animal by 

 natural means. 



* Bordet, "Bull, de la Soc. Roy. de Bruxelles," 1907. 



t ''Centralbl. f. Bakt.," etc. (Orig.), xlvhi, 64. 



I "Munchener med. Wochenschrift," IQ08, p. 1683. 



