The phytopharmacologic test devised by Pels and Macht1 for determining the toxicity of the blood serums of patients with anemia and various diseases has been applied by us. In some cases modifications of the tests were attempted. A summary of this work is reported.
The technic of the test has already been published several times by the originators. It consists in measuring the amount of retardation of the growth of rootlets in a plant nutrient solution to which has been added a small percentage of a patient's blood serum. The modifications used in our laboratory are as follows:
1. Not only a solution containing 1 per cent but also solutions containing 5, 10, 25 and 33 per cent serum were used.
2. It was found2 that seedlings of Zea mays (popcorn) responded similarly to those of Lupinus when exposed to a test solution. Other plants