%0 Journal Article %A Dalen, A. B. %T The Induction of Staphylococcal α-Toxin by Histidine %D 1973 %J Microbiology, %V 74 %N 1 %P 61-69 %@ 1465-2080 %R https://doi.org/10.1099/00221287-74-1-61 %I Microbiology Society, %X SUMMARY: Addition of histidine to cultures of Staphylococcus aureus strain Wood 46 in a synthetic amino acid medium induced α-toxin formation, intracellularly within 10 min, and extracellularly within 15 min. The induction was inhibited by actino-mycin D, chloramphenicol, sodium azide and sodium nitrite. Histidinol behaved like histidine but several histidine analogues were without inductive properties. Histamine, which was metabolized to N-acetylhistamine, inhibited growth and α-toxin production in media without histidine, but its effect was overcome by histidine or histidinol. The culture fluids were examined by polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. Precipitation with trichloracetic acid was used for concentration of the α-toxin, active toxin being recovered from the precipitate by dissolving in urea followed by heat precipitation. Three proteins appeared extracellularly in addition to α-toxin after induction with histidine. %U https://www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/journal/micro/10.1099/00221287-74-1-61