1. Bacteriophage susceptibility and cultural characteristics of BCG and other tubercle bacilli
- Author
-
Seymour Froman, Irving Krasnow, Louie Jean Conde, Annamarie Blisse, Drake W. Will, and Emil Bogen
- Subjects
Bacillus (shape) ,Bacilli ,Antigenicity ,Cultural Characteristics ,Tubercle ,Vaccination ,Virulence ,Bacillus ,General Medicine ,Mycobacterium tuberculosis ,Biology ,biology.organism_classification ,Virology ,Mycobacterium bovis ,Microbiology ,Agar plate ,Bacteriophage ,Lacticaseibacillus casei ,BCG Vaccine ,Bacteriophages - Abstract
Cultural and biochemical characteristics, bacteriophage susceptibility, antigenicity and immunogenicity of 36 strains of BCG obtained from many different sources were studied to determine the extent of their variation. Some BCG cultures on various egg media, oleic acid-albumin agar or blood agar showed an umbilicated type of colony, but others a low spreading type. The extent of cording and the intensity of neutral red staining varied in the different strains but was always less than with virulent tubercle bacilli. Some BCG cultures were susceptible only to two of the four phage preparations used but some were also lysed to some extent by the others, though none as completely as the virulent tubercle bacilli. The differences in microscopic and macroscopic morphology, cytochemical characteristics and susceptibility to four recently-isolated bacteriophages among these strains emphasizes the extent of the variations which may occur in cultures of BCG.
- Published
- 1955