Phagocytosis of red corpuscles / Ludvig Hektoen.

  • Hektoen, Ludvig, 1863-1951.
Date:
[1906]
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: Phagocytosis of red corpuscles / Ludvig Hektoen. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    r Ludvig Hektoen. (From the Memorial Institute lor Infectious Diseases, Chicago.) Savtchenko,* Levaditi,* Gruber-* all observ^ed that injection of serum of rabbits immunized with guinea-pig blood into the peri- toneal cavity of guinea-pigs is followed by a marked erythrophago- cytosis not only in the abdomen, but also in the blood-making organs, especially the spleen, and even in the circulating blood (Levaditi). In this phagocytosis take part microcytes as well as macrocytes. Ruziczka noted the occurrence of phagocytosis in vitro of red cor- puscles in the presence of the corresponding immune serum.^ This phagocytosis wSs ascribed by Savtchenko to the action upon either the phagocytes or the erythrocytes of the amboceptor or substance sensibilisatrice in the immune serum, and this explanation is not contested by either Levaditi or Gruber, A year ago Neufeld and Topfer* showed that the blood of rabbits immunized with goat blood contains a substance that by action on goat corpuscles after absorption by them renders them subject to phagocytosis by guinea- pig leucocytes in vitro. This substance, which they designated as hemotropic, had no direct action on the leucocytes. Elsewhere*^ I have pointed out that such substances should be called opsonins (hemopsonins) because of their analogy to the bacteriopsonins of Wright and Douglas who were the first to show clearly the opsonic function of the serum in phagocytosis of bacteria. Barratt’ found that doves immunized with hen blood give a serum that is strongly opsonic for hen corpuscles and demonstrated that in this, as well as other cases, the immune serum acts upon the erythrocytes and not directly upon the phagocytes. Neufeld and Topfer, as well as Barratt conclude that the hemotropic substances, or hemopsonins, are distinct * Received for publication July i, 1906. * See Gruber, loc. cit. «Ann. de I'Inst. Past., 1902, 16, p. 106. s Centralbl. /. Bakt., 1905, Orig. 37, p. 456. • Ibid., p. 233. 6 Jour. Am. Med. Assoc., 1906, 46, p. 1407. 3 Wien. klin. Wchnschr., 1903, 16, p. jo97- ’ Proc. Roy, Sgc,, B, 1905, 76, p. 324.