Repeated isolation of Dermatophilus-like organism from leprosy material

An organism having actinomycetoid type of colonies has been grown repeatedly in pure culture from leprosy material using a solid medium. The isolates obtained from different biopsies, skin scrapes and mouse foot-pad harvests were found to be similar to each other in the routine taxonomical tests and had many characters common with Dermotophilus congolensis. Similar growth could be obtained from a strain of M. leprae from armadillo and also from a DOPA-positive mycobacterium isolated previously from the blood of a leprosy patient.