really neat - Ibrahim's visualization of pleomorphic MS organisms

[Guest guest]

" [...] sera from over 50 MS cases strongly indicate that the various

organisms do represent different stages of the 'life cycle' of _one_

organism [...] "

This is a dusty old 1986 presentation abstract cited by Mattman (ed

3). Its damn fascinating.

M. Ibrahim appears never to have published a paper on this

investigation:

http://tinyurl.com/998q8

I am unable to learn anything more about him using google.

He apparantly considers it quite evident that what he observed was

not a spirochete; students of bacterial pleomorphism may feel quite

otherwise.

I have added paragraph breaks (sometimes meaningless) to ease the

eyes.

" [...] Prior to the suggestion that a 'virus' is involved, a

supposed 'spirochete' was implicated [...]

" In the course of recent studies [of MS] I found certain organisms

some of which bore a strong resemblance to those 'spirochetes' and

to the 'microspherules' or 'gemmata' that accompany them. In one

young 'acute' case (C.S.) that died accidentally I noted what

appeared to be various phases of the life cycle of a single organism

which ranged between elongated ovoids 2-3 um long, short rackets and

much longer rods which could be twisted - somewhat like spriochetes -

with terminal or subterminal 'spherules'; all elongated forms

were 'segmented'.

" Free 'spherules' in some locations were dominant and varied in

size. Small organisms were plentiful _within_ some young

hypercellular demyelinating plaques but totally absent from adjacent

ones at a slightly different stage of development. Larger organisms

were present in large numbers _at the edges_ of young but more

established plaques, often closely apposed to neuroglia

(oligodendroglia) and to neurons, sometimes apparantly invading

them. They were absent from 'chronic' cases as such, but within some

neurons there were apparantly the same sort of 'spherules'.

" The nature of these organisms is not certain but tissue culture,

ultrastructural and immunohistochemical studies, using formalin-

fixed and parafin-embedded material from (C.S.) and one other case,

and sera from over 50 MS cases strongly indicate that the various

organisms do represent different stages of the 'life cycle' of _one_

organism, a Microsporidion. This could be Encephalitozoan cuniculi

or one closely related to it. "

Ibrahim, Mohamed Z.M., Dept Human Morphology, Am. Univ. of Beirut,

Lebanon; Dept Pathology, Guy's Hosp. Med. School, London.

_On the etiology of multiple sclerosis (MS); new observations?_

Abstract of presentation to the 99th meeting of the American Assoc.

of Anatomists, April 1986. Page 58A of Anatomical Record vol 214

(1986).