Heterophil Antigen-Antibody Reactions in Relation to the Serum Diagnosis of Syphilis by Precipitation

[摘要] While studying the reactivity of the serum of a rabbit which had been injected with hen erythrocytes, and which had responded with an abundant production of heterophil (antisheep) hemolysin (Kritchewsky, Hyde), its precipitating effect on several Wassermann and Kahn “antigens” was tested. The serum flocculated powerfully with the lipoids extracted from horse heart according to Kolmer's method, and those contained in a plain alcoholic extract of guinea pig heart but it had no such effect when mixed with Kolmer's beef heart antigen nor with beef, human, and swine heart extracts prepared by Kahn's technic. An immune guinea pig antihen-cell serum lacked this specific precipitating property—its lysin being isophil.Observation of the specific reactions of this hemolytic serum with heterophil “lipoids” (horse and guinea pig) led to the thought that when such extracts are employed in diagnostic precipitation (or fixation) tests there would often be present conditions which might result in falsely positive reactions.

[学科分类] 生物科学（综合）