470 
SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 
the lesions were chiefly in the lumbar region: (1) vascular, e. g. hy- 
persemia, extravasation of red corpuscles and exudation of leucocytes ; 
(2) parenchymatous, affecting the nervous substance, chiefly the multi- 
polar cells, which were in condition of granular or vitreous degeneration, 
vacuolation, or atrophy. In the white matter the changes also were well 
marked, and chiefly in the posterior columns, where there were foci of 
degeneration principally affecting the axis-cylinders, though the myelin 
sheath and the neuroglia also participated. 
The lesions observed by the authors are ascribed by them to the 
impregnation of the nervous centres with soluble products of microbic 
origin, and are therefore toxic in nature. 
Duration of Protective Power of Diphtheria Antitoxin.* — Dr. R. 
Abel finds, from examination of the blood-serum of persons who have 
suffered from diphtheria, that from the eighth to the eleventh day after 
the disappearance of the membrane, a substance protective against diph- 
theritic infection and intoxication can be demonstrated by experiments 
on guinea-pigs. Later on this substance seems to disappear. 
The protective substance also exists in a number of healthy adults 
who have never had diphtheria ; hence such persons would be immune 
to this disease, and only those take diphtheria whose blood is devoid 
of this protective. 
Testing the protective power of the blood was performed by sub- 
cutaneous and intraperitoneal injection of guinea-pigs with small or 
large quantities of this blood-serum ; 24-48 hours later the animals were 
infected with a more than fatal dose of diphtheria. 
Bacillus of Tubercle in the Nasal Cavities of Healthy Persons.! — 
M. J. Straus has examined the nasal cavities of healthy persons who 
have been in frequent association with consumptives (physicians aud sick- 
atteudants). The nasal cavities were swabbed out with sterilised cotton- 
wool plugs, which were then steeped in water or bouillon, and the fluid 
injected into the peritoneal cavity of guinea-pigs. In 9 animals, killed 
3-5 weeks after injection, tubercular changes and tubercle bacilli were 
found. In all, 29 persons were examined, and the bacilli came from 2. 
doctors, 6 attendants, and one lay person. These results are confirma- 
tory of Cornet’s experiments on the dissemination of the tubercle bacilli 
outside the body. 
Swine-Plague, Hog-Cholera, and Pneumoenteritis of Pigs.i — Dr. 
W. Silberschmidt concludes from an examination of the virus of these 
three porcine diseases, that they are due to one and the same organism. 
Though differing somewhat in morphological characters, the three micro- 
organisms showed their relationship in the products of their metabolism,, 
their pathogenic properties, and in the morbid symptoms and lesions 
found in infected animals (rabbits, guinea-pigs, mice, pigeons). The 
difference in their virulence and toxicity is merely quantitative. Rabbits 
can be vaccinated against virulent microbes by means of blood and 
sterilised cultures, and the resistance lasts for several months. Animals 
* Centralbl. f. Bakteriol. u. Parasiteuk,, l te Abt., xvii. (1895) pp. 36-7. 
f Arch. Med. Exp. et d’Anat. Path., vi. (1894) p. 633. See Centralbl. f. Bak- 
teriol. u. Parasitenk., l*e Abt., xvii. (1895) p. 96. 
X Ann. Inst. Pasteur, ix. (1895) pp. 65-101. 
