Skin Reactions in Neurological Patients after Intracutaneous Administration of Proteolipid A extracted from Human Brain

Abstract

EXPERIMENTAL allergic encephalomyelitis as produced in monkeys, dogs, rabbits, guinea pigs and mice serves as an experimental model for the demyelinating diseases occurring in man. Such a form of encephalomyelitis can be reliably produced using either whole brain, whole white matter or diverse extracts derived from white matter. Among the latter, an especially potent effect has been ascribed to proteolipid A, which may be extracted from white matter following the procedure of Folch and Lees¹. Kies and Alvord found this compound highly antigenic although not quite so potent as whole brain when they produced the experimental disease². Åström and Waksman³ and Waksman⁴ demonstrated that experimental allergic encephalomyelitis follows the pathogenic pattern of a delayed-type hypersensitivity reaction. These authors observed a delayed reaction against myelin antigen in the diseased guinea pig, and transmitted the disease through lymphocytes from a diseased donor rabbit to a healthy recipient. So far, however, it has proved impossible to elicit a positive skin reaction against whole brain or myelin antigen in two series of human patients who were suffering from demyelinating disease of the central nervous system^5,6.