[Cultivation and demonstration of the classic swine fever virus]

Experiments were carried out for the cultivation and indication of the swine pestivirus in several continuous and in primary cell lines, using lapinized and field strains of the virus. It was demonstrated that in the various cell cultures the strains used showed varying rates of growth. In PK-15 and pig embryonic kidney cell lines, the field strains and the virulent Vratsa strain replicated with no preliminary adaptation, forming numerous large fluorescent plaques at the 16th to 18th hour. In the same cultures the lapinized strains K and Hudson had more delayed growth, forming double plaques not until the 36th hour. In rabbit kidney primary cultures the virulent K strain only exhibited growth, and up to the 4th hour at that. All results obtained were in agreement with the results from biologic experiments with pigs and rabbits. Experiments were also carried out for the indication of the swine pestivirus in infected lamellae of the cell cultures used, which were subject to additional treatment for 5 min following primary handling with the specific marked serum with the 1:40,000 solution of Evans blue. The infected cells treated by this method showed light green fluorescence of the protoplasm, with a dark nucleus, while the intact cells had tile-red cytoplasm.