CULTIVATION EXPERIMENTS ON THE GLOBOID BODIES OF POLIOMYELITIS

The globoid bodies, identical in morphological and cultural characteristics with the organisms described by Flexner and Noguchi, have been obtained in twenty-two cultures from the tissues of seven monkeys suffering from experimental poliomyelitis. Twenty of the strains were cultivated from the central nervous organs, all being obtained from the cerebrum except one, which was cultivated from the cervical portion of the spinal cord. Two strains were cultivated from the spleen. None of the cultivated strains inoculated produced typical poliomyelitis in monkeys. The recovery of a strain of the globoid bodies from the inoculated monkey is as difficult as is the original cultivation of the organisms from animals inoculated with the ordinary virus of poliomyelitis. Nothing in this study has served to implicate the streptococcus in the pathology of the poliomyelitic process; the streptococcus is, however, encountered as a common contaminant or secondary invader, especially in animals which have been etherized while moribund, or which had died some hours previous to the autopsy. When the infected and paralyzed animals are killed while still strong, secondary invading bacteria, including the streptococcus, tend to be absent from the tissues. A modified, perhaps improved, but alternative method has been devised for the cultivation of the globoid bodies and other microorganisms demanding a high degree of anaerobiosis.