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Experimental granulomas were induced in lepromatous volunteers, rabbits and guinea pigs, by the intradermal injection of incomplete Freund's adjuvant. Experimental hypercholesterolemic xanthomatosis was produced in rabbits by cholesterol feeding. Despite histological and histochemical similarities between such lesions and lepromata, and the fact that chloroform-methanol extracts of experimental lesions bound methylene blue, no coloring could be seen after parenteral administration of this dye at doses far above those needed to stain lepromata. The blueing phenomenon, then, is one of relative specificity. We suggest that it is due to some metabolic derangement induced by Mycobacterium leprae in a susceptible parasitized macrophage. This might involve oxidation-reduction processes and/or some unusual lipid from cells or bacilli, that were able to hind methylene blue in a stable complex. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A clinical and biochemical study of twelve persons in the same family, including two hemizygous and one typical heterozygous patients, for Fabry's disease is reported. Two obligate heterozygous females—daughters of the index case—lacked any of the clinical manifestations found in typical heterozygous carriers, having also normal α-galactosidase activity in peripheral leukocytes and normal urinary excretion of trihexosylceramide and digalactosylceramide. Blood group serology was determined to exclude illegitimacy. The validity of these findings and some possible explanations are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]