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An assay of antibodies to 15 various viruses and mycoplasma pneumoniae was performed on the serum specimens from 441 patients with Parkinson disease and from 443 healthy controls matched by sex, age, and place of residence, or from a representative group of these matched pairs. The main finding was a higher herpes simplex complement-fixing antibody level in patients with Parkinson disease than in controls. Patients with Parkinson disease had higher herpes simplex antibody titers more often than did their matched controls, and the matched controls, respectively, had low titers more often than the patients. The mean herpes simplex antibody titer (log₂) of the patients (4.9) was significantly higher than that of controls (4.6) (p < 0.01). This difference was also demonstrable when matched pairs were analysed for paired differences of herpes simplex antibody titers. For other viral CF and HI antibodies studied and for mycoplasma pneumoniae CF antibody, there were no significant differences either in the mean titers or in the distribution of individual titer values between the patients with Parkinson disease and the matched controls.

The role of lysosomes in the pathogenesis of MS was studied by biochemical and ultrastructural techniques. Biochemical studies were performed on samples from 21 MS autopsies. The analyses included assays of acid proteinase, acid phosphatase, peptidase, neutral proteinase and esterase. The material for electron microscopy was obtained from ten biopsies made on MS patients during stereotaxic thalamotomy. In preliminary studies, the effect of autolysis on enzymatic activities was measured. These studies showed that acid hydrolases were stable enough to warrant further investigation. All enzyme activities studied were increased at the border zones of plaques, whereas in the macroscopically normal white matter only acid hydrolase activities were increased. Correspondingly, in electron microscopic studies, increased lysosomal response was found especially in astrocytes but also in oligodendrocytes. In astrocytes the number of heterolysosomes was conspicously increased and they were seen both in the perikaryon and in the cell processes. Such lysosomes often contained myelin-like membrane material. The presence of foreign phagocytizing cells could not be demonstrated except around the blood vessels. Furthermore, it appeared that myelin layers were not phagocytized by direct peeling process. These studies, suggest that early lysosomal changes occur in MS white matter and that such changes are mainly due to the phagocytosis of myelin inside astrocyte lysosomes. The possibility that the astrocyte response is a secondary phenomenon, which is preceded by other myelin destroying mechanisms is discussed.