ABSTRACT
References................................................................................................................23
The distribution, prevalence, and dramatic manifestations of bacteriophages make it surprising that they were not recognized for almost 40 years after the beginning of serious bacteriological work in the laboratories of Europe and America in about 1880. In retrospect, there are a few reports in the literature that hint at the presence of bacteriophages, but the interpretations in these papers did not suggest useful pathways for further research. Hankin (1896) reported that the waters of the Jumna and Ganges Rivers in India had antiseptic activity against many kinds of bacteria, and against the cholera vibrio in particular. This activity was filterable and destroyed by boiling. He concluded that the antiseptic principle was some volatile chemical substance. Emmerich and Löw (1901) reported in that some substance in autolyzed cultures was capable of causing the lysis of diverse cultures, of curing experimental infections, and of providing prophylactic immunity to subsequent inoculations. In addition, there is substantial literature on bacterial autolysis by Gamalieya, Malfitano, Kruse, and Pansini, which was reviewed by Otto and Munter (1923). At this point, however, it is difficult to provide unambiguous interpretations of these early studies. Although some of these observations are compatible with the action of bacteriophages,
others suggest bacteriocin effects and still others may be attributable to lytic enzyme production. These reports all describe experiments on liquid cultures, and in this period of bacteriology, a culture was conceptualized not in terms of the population dynamics of individual cells, but as an organism in itself. It was not until the 1920s that a significant shift in thinking took place that allowed a reconceptualization of the bacterial cell as the organism rather than the entire culture (Summers, 1991). The first dramatic and clear experiments on bacteriophages employed cultures on solid medium, and they were based on the observation of localized bacteriolysis (i.e., plaques).
