Isolation and maintenance of an L1-like culture fromFusiformis necrophorus(Syn. Bact. funduliforme, Bacteroides funduliformis)

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Abstract
The studý of theFusiformis necrophorusculture ‘132’ showed that new pure LI cultures could be isolated from it, which have already been maintained for one year and undergone more than 100 passages without reverting to their original type. The new cultures resemble the old L 1 strains fromStreptobacillus moniliformisin every respect except for their strict anaerobiosis. It has been observed that swellings of the bacteria develop into large bodies not distinguishable from the elements of which the pure L 1 culture consists.In the light of the new observations onFusiformis necrophoruswhich are in full agreement with those of Dienes & Smith it is still not possible to disprove the symbiosis theory, for the newly established L 1 cultures have not reverted so far. Secondly, though it has been seen that L 1 forms develop from swellings of bacteria, the possibility that a parasite might behave in a similar way cannot be excluded.On the other hand Dienes's opinion of the bacterial nature of the L 1 component cannot be disproved either. However, we know yet too little about the normal developmental cycle of bacteria to be able to decide whether the L 1 form is an independent entity or whether it may be a normal stage through which bacteria have to pass from time to time or whether it may represent a ‘loss-mutant’ which some bacteria might produce under not yet known conditions. If in the future the bacterial nature of the L1 could be convincingly proved we would be faced with the fact that bacteria can assume a form in which they grow as a thin shapeless slime containing nuclear structures arranged as bodies, rings or very finely dispersed particles—not the dumbbell pattern so characteristic for young bacteria of all kinds—and that further very small parts of the material (filterable granules?) are able to reproduce the L1 culture which at least can go on for many years without reverting into the bacterium from which it was derived.