Cultivating Spirochetes on Liquid Media. 185 



cm. 3 , absorbing 0.3 cm. 3 of w/5 Ba[OH] 2 , in average of several 

 determinations. VanSlyke's gave with T = 23 0 C. and bar- 

 ometer = 734 mm., non-absorbing 0.34 g. nitrogen and absorb- 

 ing the same. The samples were in all cases positive to ninhydrin, 

 showing that some alpha-amino acids were present in the filtrates, 

 but in such small amounts that they were not recognizable by the 

 methods used. 



It may be well argued, as it was in the earlier work with amino- 

 acids in the blood, that these compounds are so quickly removed 

 from the sphere of action that at any one time they are present in 

 only minute quantities. It is well known that phagocytes crowd 

 into the tissues of the metamorphosing organs after the earlier 

 stages of dissolution are under way and it may be through their 

 agency that the products of proteolysis are removed. Mercier 1 

 has been able to trace the circulation of phagocytes throughout the 

 metamorphosing organs and the body by causing the cells to 

 engulf carmin granules and it may be that the end products of 

 the action of proteolytic enzymes which we must imagine to be 

 developed at the beginning of dissolution of the muscles, etc., are 

 taken up and carried to the body proper by these cells. This 

 conception, however, does not give any support to the so-called 

 phagocytic theory of involutionary phenomena, for it is quite 

 certain that dissolution has begun before the wandering phagocytes 

 have entered the tissues affected. 



In vitro studies of autolysis of normal and involuting larvae are 

 in progress. 



115 (932) 



A simplified method for cultivating spirochaetes on liquid media. 



By J. Bronfenbrenner. 



[From the Pathological and Research Laboratories of the Western 

 Pennsylvania Hospital, Pittsburgh, Pa.] 



The method I wish to describe is a modification of the original 

 method of Noguchi 2 for cultivating spirochaetes, which I think 



1 Arch. zool. exper. et gen., T. 5, Ser. IVe, I, p. 151, 1906. 

 J Joum. Exp. Med., 1912, XV, p. 211. 



