280 



Scientific Proceedings (129) 



Abstracts of Communications. 

 Pacific Coast Branch 

 Thirty-sixth meeting. 



San Francisco, California, February 14, 1923. 



134 (2094) 



An anaerobe from the mou*:h cavity of man and rabbits mor- 

 phologically suggesting B. pneumosintes. 



By W. L. HOLMAN and F. H. KROCK. 



[From the Department of Bacteriology and Experimental Path- 

 ology, Stanford University, California.] 



One of us (W. L. H.) reported in 1919 the isolation of a 

 minute anaerobe out of material from the mouth of five con- 

 secutive persons not suffering from influenza, in Pittsburgh, 

 Pennsylvania. 



The material was cultured on cooked meat and other media, 

 and the bacterium attracted attention because of the abundance 

 of gas it produced in cooked meat medium, but more particular- 

 ly on account of its small size and the chance of its being con- 

 fused in direct smears and mixed cultures with B. influenza. 

 It was thought at the time to be closely related to the Staphylo- 

 coccus parvulus of Veillon and Zitber, but the descriptions of this 

 gram negative anaerobe are too meager to permit complete iden- 

 tification. An anaerobe, which we considered to be the same, 

 was reported at the meeting of the Association of Pathologists 

 and Bacteriologists in May, 1922, as "A very small anaerobe 

 giving gas in tissue." The site of infection in the neck of this 

 patient was in direct communication with the mouth cavity, and 

 it may well have been an accidental contamination or something 

 more important. A non-hemolytic streptococcus was found as- 

 sociated with it. 



Anaerobes which we consider as identical with the six strains 

 mentioned have been readily isolated from the mouth cavity of 

 four of us in the laboratory at Stanford University, California. 

 It would appear that this anaerobe, or very closely related forms, 



