Immunology of syphilis.

Abstract

Many advances have been made in solving microbiological and immu­ nological enigmas since 1905 when Schaudinn & Hoffmann (1) identified the causal organism of syphilis. However, over 60 years later we still are unable to grow virulent Treponema pallidum on artificial media, do not have a vac­ cine, know little about the immunological mechanisms of this disease, and are again seeing syphilis sweep the world in epidemic proportion. Many unanswered questions of host-parasite relationship are of concern to students of the disease. For example, what is the true relationship of the organism and its products to CIutton's joints and interstitial keratitis as seen in congenital syphilis or to the gumma of late syphilis? Nor can we answer why some infected individuals develop cardiovascular or neurosyph­ ilis while others manifest only a reactive serologic test for syphilis. It is not possible to present in the allotted space an extensive treatise on reports of a rather voluminous literature about various immunological as­ pects of naturally acquired and experimental syphilis. We will, instead, pre­ sent selected representative reports and pose further questions on the im­ munology of syphilis by. presenting certain research that we hope will stimu­ late your own interest in the field. Extensive reviews are those of Neisser (2), Chesney (3), Urbach & Beer­ man (4), and Magnuson (5). More recent papers on the subject are those of Wigfield (6) and Cannefax (7). Serologic tests for syphilis are not given detailed coverage in this review. Discussions of serologic tests for syphilis in current use can be found in ar­ ticles by Nicholas & Beerman (8), Wallace (9), and Gillespie & Brown (10).