EXPERIMENTAL DISSEMINATED ENCEPHALOPATHY IN THE MONKEY

Abstract

It has recently been shown that injection of suspensions or extracts of brain tissue may produce an experimental type of encephalopathy bearing certain similarities to forms observed in the human being. In 1925 Koritschoner and Schweinburg,1and in 1932 Hurst,2obtained paralysis in rabbits after injections of human brain tissue. However, these investigators were unable to demonstrate pathologic changes in the nervous system of the affected animals. After these experiments, Rivers, Sprunt and Berry3and Rivers and Schwentker,4by repeated intramuscular injections of aqueous emulsions and alcohol-ether extracts of sterile normal rabbit brains, produced in monkeys a type of encephalomyelitis accompanied by destruction of myelin. Signs of disseminated lesions of the central nervous system became manifest after injections had been continued for several months. The pathologic changes consisted of areas of demyelination scattered throughout the central nervous system. These were perivascular and contained a variety of