NOTES ON BACILLUS BOTULINUS

Abstract

The production of heterologous toxins by different strains of B. botulinus was first recognized by Leuchs, in 1910. He produced antitoxins in horses for both the Ellezelles and Darmstadt strains and found that the antitoxin of the Ellezelles strain would protect against the toxin of its own strain but not against the toxin of the Darmstadt strain, and vice versa. In 1917 Dr. E. C. Dickson of the Stanford Medical School, San Francisco, produced antitoxins in three goats, which were immunized against his strains III, IV and VI, respectively. He found that strains III and IV, which he had isolated from outbreaks of botulism in California and Oregon were homologous. Strain VI, however, which was isolated in Albany, New York, from cheese which had caused the death of several persons, produced a toxin which was not neutralized by the antitoxin of either strain III or strain IV. Neither would the antitoxin of strain VI neutralize the toxins of strains III or IV. By means of toxin-antitoxin tests I have identified twelve strains of B. botulinus from material obtained in different parts of California and one from an outbreak of food poisoning in Seattle, Washington. Five of the California strains came directly from outbreaks of poisoning from home-canned vegetables and fruits. One came from hay suspected in a case of forage poisoning in horses. The other six had no direct connection with cases of poisoning. (Burke, 1919 b). These twelve strains fall into two distinct types as shown by the toxin-antitoxin