8
Studies on Newcastle (Ranikhet) Disease Virus
Picard [1930] experimented with a number of drugs, such as potassium
permanganate, zonite, neosalvarsan and urotropine, but failed to demonstrate
their therapeutic value.
Naik [1936] carried out a series of experiments with trypan blue, three
under field conditions and one under artificial conditions. His favourable
findings were not, however, confirmed by Shirlaw [1937]. Preliminary experi-
ments by Shirlaw on the value of camphor in Newcastle disease used after the
method of Jacotot and Le Roux [1935] against rinderpest afforded encouraging
results, but, when applied on a large scale, they were not uniform.
For immunization, Picard [1930] tried a variety of vaccines such as dry-
chalk-vaccine ; Umeno-and-Doi's carbol-glycerine saline vaccine used in
rabies; Kelser's chloroform vaccine for rinderpest; mitigation of the virus
by passage through pigeons ; and the production of immune serum from
turkeys and geese. He considered success by any of these methods unlikely.
In 1932, he tried the ether-virus vaccination similar to Bailly's rabies vaccina-
tion ; vaccination through injection of the virus into the feather quill; gall
vaccination according to Koch's rinderpest immunization; and the use of
bacteriophage vaccine consisting of a filtrate of the faeces of a hen recovered
from the disease, stimulated through contact with brain virus filtrate, again
with little hope of success. However, by the feather quill method of immuniz-
ation, he succeeded in establishing protection against a virus infection with 100
M. L. D., though he was unable to immunize against higher doses of infection by
artificial inoculation and natural infection. The same author, in 1933, reported
unsuccessful results of experiments on organ vaccine using virulent brain,
liver, spleen, and egg yolk infected with the passage virus.
In India, Cooper [1931] obtained some success from the use of serum from
recovered birds. With the object of developing a simultaneous method of
immunization, his efforts to prepare a serum on a large scale from donkeys by
hyper-immunization met with no success. He also prepared a vaccine accord-
ing to Kelser's vaccine for rinderpest which again was of no value.
Kylasamier [1931] reported that a vaccine made of organ emulsion con-
taining 1 per cent toluol and attenuated by 1 in 1000 formalin gave some
useful results.
Nakamura, Oyama and Wagatsuma [1937] claimed to have had some
success with a formalized tissue-vaccine. The brain, spleen and liver of a
fowl dead of experimental intra-cerebral infection were used in the preparation
of the vaccine. A mixed saline emulsion of these organs was diluted with an
equal volume of fowl serum (1:3 ). One part of 2 per cent Merck's formalin
was added to ten parts of the mixture and kept at 37°C. for three days and
then stored in the ice box or in the cold room.
At the Imperial Veterinary Research Institute, Mukteswar, where the
writer had been working on this disease, several experiments on the problem
of prophylaxis and control were conducted. Haddow [1933, 1935 and 1936]
mentioned that formalinized tissues, prepared in a manner similar to those
used for rinderpest, had been tried with unsatisfactory results. Tissues,
rapidly dried at 0°C. in vacuo, were also tried. Although the first batch of
vaccines appeared to be satisfactory, these results could not be repeated. It
was shown that immunity could be produced at doses slightly lower than those