Complementary and Opsonic Functions in Their Relation to Immunity

Open Access
Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
Summary: The great deficiency noted by Ramon C. Downing in the complementary power of the blood serum of some guinea-pigs, has been confirmed by the writer's experiments. Complement titrations made by the writer, in which positive and negative control was employed, seemed to indicate that the apparent lack of complement in the blood serum of some guineapigs is not due to the presence therein of anything interfering with the action of amboceptor. The biological tests applied to the blood serum of complement-deficient guinea-pigs which had been systematically immunized by repeated inoculations, gave positive evidence of the presence of both bacteriolytic and agglutinating antibodies; moreover, when inoculated with large doses of live virulent culture, such guinea-pigs manifested more or less active immunity to the bacteria injected. Titration of the blood serum of complement-deficient guinea-pigs, before and after the production of active immunity, gave practically the same complement titer. The results of experimental inoculation of one hundred non-immunized complement-deficient guinea-pigs and a like number of complement-normal guinea-pigs, seem to indicate that complement bears some relation to natural immunity. The results of counting the bacteria in 4800 leucocytes of complement-deficient and complement-normal guinea-pigs show that the phagocytic index of the serum of complement-deficient guinea-pigs is about one half that of the complement-normal animals.

This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: