Aerobic bacteria in house dust

per cent. Clinical rcsponscs encompass the range of known al Icrgica rcact.ioiis. Clinical petroleum sensitivity is best detretcd by nicans of a tlctailrd history. Advanced instances are usuall,v associated with multiple sensitixatiori, inc~lutling specific allergy to foods, drugs, and particulate inhalants. \\'hen 11011se tlusi allergy Coexists, therapy with phenol-free hous(~ (lust est,ract is l)articnlarl~ helpful but. the avoidance of esposuro to petroleum, coal, gas am1 pincl, as far as this is possible, represents the major approach in therapy. 38. AEHOBlC BACTBKLZ 1N 110IJHl~: IRJST MORTON C. KAHN, D.Se., K. MARILYN SNART, MA., ~IOKACE S. B~~I,I~~IN, M.U., J1.1)., New YORK, IV. Y. .ZND &IURRAY I)\IT~RETzKY! (From the Uepwtmcnt of Public HenTth and Prcucntirc~ Xdirinc mad the lk~prrrlmc~~~t II/ Allergy

illdicine,

I)irision.

C’o?xvll

CniurTsity

Mcdicnl

(‘oll~~y~~,-VC K York

flTo.spitnlJ

Bacteriologic investigations were carried out on weighed portions from thirty-eight varied samples of house dust. These were cultured aerobically. Colonies were then isolated and cliffcrentiated morphologically and biochemically. Strains isolated were chiefly saprophytic forms of the following families: Bacillaceae (present in 100 l)er cent of (lust samples), Micrococcaceae (89 per cent), Bacteriaceae (58 per cent), Corynebacteriaceae (45 per cent), Enterobacteriaceae (26 per cent)? Neisseriaceac (11 per cent), and Lactobacteriaceae (3 per cent ) . In order to check the admittedly empirical culture method, eight of the dust samples were cultured a second time, and these duplicate samples paralleled the original results. Gross bacterial counts from 48 hour ngar pour plates of ten varied dust samples showed a witle range-from 29,000 colonies per gram to 4,038,OOO colonies per gram. The average count for the ten samples was 1,802,850 colonies per grant. This study indicates that the l)ac+erial flora in house dust varies wide]) both qualitatively and quantitatively. 39. A STUDY

OF AN ALLII:l:GENT(: l”l,AVOlYOl I) (;1,1-~‘OSlI>E FROM EXTRACTS Oh’ TIMOTHY- POLLEN AND SAM FRANKEL,

(From

the Department

of Medicine,

1~1~1~1\‘I51)

&I.A4., ST. IIOIJIS, RIO. Washington

Fnirmsi.ty

Sc7rool of .IlcdicincJ

Crystals often appear spontaneously in both plain and glycerinatetl esSince we enrountered skin reactivity to the tracts of certain grass pollnis. isolated crystals, a study was undertaken to identify them chemically and to The greatest yields of the crystals (0.3 evaluate their allergenic activity. per cent) were obtained from the ethanolic Soxhlet extractions of ether dcfatted pollen. In 1931, Moore and Moore designated as “dactylin” similar crystals which they isolated from extracts of t,irnothy and orchard grass They established the formula of these crystals provisionally as pollen. and suggested t,hnt they were a glucoside closely related to thta C,,II,,O,,, Stull and associates (1932) also reported their preserlce in hydroxyflavones. extracts of timothy pollen. In the present investigation, we made use of chromatographic methods for the study of flavonoids as recently described by Bate-Smith and Westall: Tn all chrornatographic studies and Cage, Douglass, Casteel, and Wender. multiple solvents were employed. The aglycone obtdnrd on hydrolysis of t,he glycoside yielded Rf’s, color and UV characteristics idrntjical with siniultnnt>The intact, glycoside hehnvcd different~ly front ously processed quercetin. simultaneously processed isoquercitrin, qucrcitrin, and rlncrc~ctin. The ~01~1~1~~