Effect of nutrition on the production of acute disseminated encephalomyelitis in mice.

The susceptibility of homozygous BSVS mice to acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADE) has been found to be nutritionally dependent. On a laboratory stock regimen of commercial fox chow pellets, whole wheat bread, and milk this genotype is 100 per cent susceptible to the disease. On a "synthetic" diet, containing a minimal list of vitamins adequate for growth and maintenance, susceptibility was found to be reduced to 15 per cent.

Homotypic complement-fixing antibody in monkeys infected with type 2 poliomyelitis virus by the oral route.

CF tests with Type 2 poliomyelitis antigen (MEF1) were performed on the pre- and postinfection sera of 20 cynomolgus monkeys which developed paralytic, non-paralytic, or inapparent infection following oral administration of a Type 2 strain of virus (Y-SK). All the monkeys developed neutralizing antibody, and 17 developed CF antibody in an original serum dilution titer of 1:4 or greater. The 3 monkeys which did not develop this level of CF antibody were in a group of 7 which died within 8 days after onset of paralysis.

Development, persistence, and significance of type 2, poliomyelitis complement-fixing antibody in man.

Sera from 81 patients with a diagnosis of paralytic or non-paralytic poliomyelitis, and from 159 individuals of similar age groups giving no history of the disease, were tested with a high titered, complement-fixing poliomyelitis antigen of Type 2 (Lansing-like). The antigen consisted of brain tissue from newborn mice injected with the MEF1 strain of virus as previously adapted to these animals. The presence or absence of Type 2 neutralizing antibody in the sera under test was found not to affect the complement fixation.

A specific complement-fixation test for infection with poliomyelitis virus.

A complement-fixing antigen has been developed, using as source of material CNS tissue from newborn mice infected with the newborn mouse-adapted strain of the Lansing type, MEF1 virus. With this antigen, specific reactions have been obtained with sera from mice, cotton rats, and monkeys immunized with the Lansing-type virus, and from monkeys and chimpanzees convalescent from infection with this virus. Twenty-one of 35 human sera obtained from individuals convalescent from poliomyelitis were positive and 6 of 22 from apparently normal persons having Lansing-neutralizing antibody, while this held true for only 1 of 19 from those having no Lansing-neutralizing antibody.

Adaptation of a Lansing strain of poliomyelitis virus to newborn mice.

By means of rapid serial passages, including 3 successive "blind" passages, the MEF1 strain, a Lansing-type poliomyelitis virus, has been adapted to new-born mice. The virus can readily be propagated in newborn mice, in which fully adapted virus induces in almost all inoculated animals the experimental disease, resulting in a much greater infectivity for the central nervous system and a uniformly short and regular incubation period.

Experimental disseminated encephalomyelitis in white mice.

Disseminated encephalomyelitis was readily induced in mice of the Swiss strain by means of repeated intramuscular and subcutaneous injections of apparently normal mouse brain mixed with an adjuvant. The latter consisted of autoclaved virulent tubercle bacilli and heavy liquid petrolatum, a modification of the Freund adjuvant. The syndrome and the histopathological picture of the induced malady were essentially similar to those in monkeys, rabbits, and guinea pigs, previously reported by others.