Bacteriolytic Element found in Tissues and Secretions. 313 



sion of the M. lysodeikticus incubating the tubes at 45° C, and noting whether 

 any lysis took place as evidenced by a clearing of the opacity of the suspension. 

 Some of these tissues were obtained from the postmortem room, others from 

 laboratory workers or from the operating theatre. The results obtained can 

 be summed up by saying that all the tissues and organs possessed some lytic 

 power, even a few hairs from the head causing solution of the cocci. While 

 in these tests no attempt was made at an exact quantitative estimation, it 

 was noticed that lysis proceeded very much more rapidly with some tissues 

 than with others. Briefly, it may be said that epidermal structures, the 

 lining membrane of the respiratory tract and especially the connective tissues 

 (whether fibrous, fatty or cartilaginous) contained large amounts of lysozyme 

 affecting M. lysodeikticus. The rapidity of the lysis with cartilage was so 

 striking that an attempt was made to estimate more accurately the amount 

 of lysozyme in this tissue. A small portion of cartilage from the patella 

 (deep to the articular surface) was weighed and ground up in a mortar with 

 a measured volume of salt solution. This was allowed to extract for 6 hours 

 when it was centrifuged and the supernatant fluid was added in various 

 dilutions to a suspension of the M. lysodeikticus. It was found that with 

 an extract corresponding to one part of the original cartilage in 1,300 parts 

 of normal salt solution, there was complete lysis of the cocci in 5 minutes 

 at 45° C. which shows that cartilage has approximately one-tenth the 

 lysozyme-content of tears. 



The presence of lysozyme was sought for in certain physiological and 

 pathological fluids, and the results are set forth in Table I. 



Table I. 



Fluids containing lysozyme. 



Fluids not containing lysozyme. 



Tears. 

 Sputum. 

 Nasal mucus. 

 Saliva. 



Blood serum. 

 Blood plasma. 

 Peritoneal fluid. 

 Pleural effusion. 

 Hydrocoele fluid. 

 Ovarian cyst fluid. 

 Sebum. 



Pus from acne pustule. 



Sero pus from a " cold " abscess in the 



popliteal space. 

 Urine containing much, albumin and 



pus. 



Semen (very weak). 



Normal urine. 



Cerebro-spinal fluid. 



Sweat (one sample only tested.) 



