Growth of Non-Sporulating Anaerobic Bacteria of Intestinal Origin in Synthetic Media: I. General Requirements and Special Importance of Pyruvic Acid.

The predominance of the non-sporulating anaerobic bacteria in the flora of the human intestinal tract has been repeatedly shown by the investigations of Eggerth and Gagnon (1933), Weiss and Rettger (1937), Misra (1938), and Lewis and Rettger (1940). The pathogenicity of related species has been recorded by Henthorne, Thompson and Beaver (1936), Dack, Dragstedt and Heinz (1937), Dack (1940), Brown ,Williams and Herrell (1941) and others. The difficulties of isolation and subculturing have so limited the study of these anaerobes that their importance is scarcely recognized and certainly not understood. Egg-meat and brain media have been used for the maintenance of stock cultures, but they are not well adapted for the isolation and biochemical studies of these bacteria because of difficulty of manipulation, lack of clarity and extreme complexity. Lewis, Bedell and Rettger (1940) developed a tryptone-glucose-cysteine medium which was useful for isolation and certain