Applications of Primary Cell Cultures in the Study of Animal Viruses †

Tissue culture has been used for the study of animal viruses since 1906 when Aldershoff and Boers first grew vaccinia in rabbit tissue separate from the whole host.2 Other limited successes were obtained in the years following, but extensive use of tissue culture in animal virology awaited the studies of Enders, Weller, and Robbins' on a human agent, poliovirus. Since then, the use of tissue culture techniques has led to a revolution of methodology in the whole field of animal virus research, entirely comparable to that in the human virus field. Methods of cell dispersal developed by Dulbecco and Vogt,8 and since extensively modified,"' ff have provided simple and accurate means for studying viruses indigenous to almost every animal species. With the new methods viruses have been isolated from the skin, respiratory tract, blood and enteric tract of a variety of animal species. Viruses isolated from the blood have been chiefly members of the arbor group and will be discussed in another paper of this series. Enteric agents have been isolated from poultry," cats,' dogs,' swine, ' and cattle."' X General reviews of these studies have been made by Hsiung and Melnick,' and Kal