Identification of Corynebacterium Diphtheriae with Fluorescent Antibacterial Reagents.

Moody, Max D. (Communicable Disease Center, Atlanta, Ga.) and Wallis L. Jones. Identification of Corynebacterium diphtheriae with fluorescent antibacterial reagents. J. Bacteriol. 86:285-293. 1963.-Conditions are described whereby fluorescent-antibody reagents could be prepared and used to identify Corynebacterium diphtheriae in pure and mixed cultures and in clinical materials. The use of O and OK antigens for immunization of rabbits to prepare the antibody was compared. The most satisfactory reagents were those made from serum of rabbits injected with live (OK) suspensions of C. diphtheriae. Such fluorescent reagents were used successfully in direct and indirect fluorescent-antibody tests to identify both toxinogenic and atoxinogenic C. diphtheriae but not to differentiate the two kinds of organisms.