1. A method of testing sera for protective power against yellow fever is described and designated as the intraperitoneal protection test in mice.
2. The test consists essentially of the inoculation of mice intra-peritoneally with yellow fever virus, fixed for mice, together with the serum to be tested, and the simultaneous injection of starch solution into the brain to localize the virus. If the serum lacks protective power the mice die of yellow fever encephalitis.
3. The test is highly sensitive. Consequently it is useful in epidemiological studies to determine whether individuals have ever had yellow fever and in tests to find whether vaccinated persons or animals have in reality been immunized.
4. When mice were given large intraperitoneal injections of yellow fever virus fixed for mice, the virus could be recovered from the blood for 4 days although encephalitis did not occur. If the brain was mildly injured at the time of the intraperitoneal injection, the symptoms of yellow fever encephalitis appeared 6 days later, but the virus was then absent from the blood.
5. Strains of white mice vary greatly in their susceptibility to yellow fever.
1. By the bites of stegomyia mosquitoes carrying neurotropic yellow fever virus, encephalitis has been produced both in white mice and in rhesus monkeys.
2. The fixed neurotropic strain of virus cannot be maintained in the mosquito host as well as can the viscerotropic strains. This is doubtless attributable in part to a smaller amount of virus ingested, because of paucity in the blood stream of the mammalian host.
3. These experiments furnish additional evidence that the long established neurotropic yellow fever virus has changed fundamentally from the parent French strain.
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