Immune sera : haemolysins, cytotoxins, and precipitins / by A. Wasserman.

  • Wasserman, August von, 1866-1925.
Date:
1904
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: Immune sera : haemolysins, cytotoxins, and precipitins / by A. Wasserman. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

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    the combining group of the substance and that of the side-chain. To repeat the simile we used above, the relation must be like that of lock and key, i.e., the two groups must fit accurately. Hence not every substance will fit all the side-chains of an organism. It will combine only with those for which it possesses a fitting group. Receptors—Weigert's Overproduction Theory.—This doctrine of the chemistry of the organism's me- tabolism Ehrlich applied to the action of toxins and antitoxins. The toxin, he said, can act only when its haptophore group happens to fit to one of the side-chains, or receptors, as he now pre- fers to call them. As a result of this combination, the toxophore group is able to act on the cell and injure it. If we take as an example tetanus, in which all the symptoms are due to the central ner- vous system, the side-chain theory assumes that the haptophore group of the tetanus poison fits exactly and is combined with the side-chains or receptors of the central nervous system. Other experiments, which we will not reproduce here, have shown us unquestionably that the action of the antitoxins depends on the fact that this com- bines with the haptophore group of the poison and so satisfies the latter's affinity. Ehrlich, therefore, concluded that the antitoxin is nothing else than the side-chains or receptors which are given off by the cells and thrust into the circulation. The way in which these side-chains or receptors are thrust