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tuberculin

 
Dictionary: tu·ber·cu·lin   (tʊ-bûr'kyə-lĭn, tyʊ-) pronunciation
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n.
A sterile liquid containing proteins extracted from cultures of tubercle bacilli and used in tests for tuberculosis.

[Latin tūberculum, tubercle; see tubercle + -IN.]


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Veterinary Dictionary: tuberculin
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Home > Library > Animal Life > Veterinary Dictionary

A sterile liquid containing the growth products of, or specific substances extracted from the tubercule bacillus; used in various forms in the diagnosis of tuberculosis.

  • heat concentrated synthetic medium (HCSM) t. — similar to old tuberculin, but grown on synthetic medium.
  • new t. — a suspension of the fragments of tubercle bacilli, freed from all soluble materials and with glycerine added.
  • old t. — a sterile solution of concentrated, soluble products of the growth of the tubercle bacillus, adjusted to standard potency by addition of glycerin and isotonic sodium chloride solution, final glycerin content being about 50%.
  • purified protein derivative (PPD) of t. — a form of tuberculin used in the testing of animals for tuberculosis; abbreviated PPD. It is a soluble protein fraction prepared from a synthetic medium on which the Mycobacterium bovis has been cultured. It has the advantage of reducing the number and severity of the reactions caused by nonspecific sensitizing materials in the culture medium in old tuberculin.
  • t. reaction — the prototype delayed or type IV hypersensitivity; typified by swelling and redness at the site of inoculation of tuberculin.
  • t. tests — a number of tests for tuberculosis, based on the use of tuberculin as a test agent, are used in animals. A short thermal test using a large volume of tuberculin injected subcutaneously is used in special circumstances. Most of the tests use an intradermal injection and a local swelling as a positive reaction.
Wikipedia: Tuberculin
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This article is about Tuberculin, the antigen used in the tuberculin skin test for tuberculosis. For information about the tuberculin skin test, see Mantoux test.

Tuberculin is the name given to extracts of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, M. bovis, or M. avium that is used in skin testing in animals and humans to identify a tuberculosis infection.[1][2] Several types of tuberculin have been used for this, of which purified protein derivative (PPD) is the most important. PPD is a poorly-defined, complex mixture of antigens. Tests based upon PPD are relatively unspecific since many of its proteins are found in different mycobacterial species.

History

Tuberculin was discovered by German scientist and physician Robert Koch in 1890. The original tuberculin discovered by Koch was a glycerine extract of the tubercle bacilli and was developed as a remedy for tuberculosis, but it was ineffective in this role. Clemens von Pirquet discovered that patients who had previously received injections of horse serum or smallpox vaccine had quicker, more severe reactions to a second injection, and he coined the word allergy to describe this hypersensitivity reaction. Soon thereafter von Pirquet discovered the same type of reaction took place in those infected with tuberculosis, and he thus found the utility of what would become the tuberculin skin test. The test used in the United States at present is referred to as the Mantoux test. An alternative test called the Heaf test was used in the United Kingdom until 2005, although the UK now uses the Mantoux test in line with the rest of the world. Both of these tests use the tuberculin derivative PPD.

References

  1. ^ Tizard, Ian R. (2004). Veterinary immunology: an introduction (7th ed.). Philadelphia: Saunders. ISBN 0-7216-0136-7. 
  2. ^ Walport, Mark; Murphy, Kenneth; Janeway, Charles; Travers, Paul J. (2008). Janeway's Immunobiology (7th ed.). New York: Garland Science. pp. 774. ISBN 0-8153-4123-7. http://books.google.com/books?id=76LV6OzS204C&pg=PA774. Retrieved on 2009-04-28. 

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Copyrights:

Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Veterinary Dictionary. Saunders Comprehensive Veterinary Dictionary 3rd Edition. Copyright © 2007 by D.C. Blood, V.P. Studdert and C.C. Gay, Elsevier. All rights reserved.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Tuberculin".  Read more