Bacteriostatic Properties of Histiocytes Toward Mycobacterium tuberculosis as Determined by the Single Cell Method. ∗ †

Summary

Under the experimental conditions described, it would seem that the histiocytes of normal guinea pigs are in many instances capable of exerting at least bacteriostatic properties toward engulfed Mycobacterium tuberculosis of the human variety when phagocytosis occurs in vivo. Of 101 tubes of Corper's egg medium seeded with a total of 4190 histiocytes, 1513 or 34.8% which had engulfed the mycobacteria, growth was obtained in only 2 instances, or 2%. When comparably small numbers of free Mycobacterium tuberculosis were inoculated upon the same medium, growth was obtained in 28.8% of the tubes employed. As no fragmentation of the bacteria within the histiocytes was observed, the bacteriostatic action exerted may be possibly explained as due to a disturbance in the metabolism of the engulfed Mycobacterium tuberculosis.