One hundred and fourteen strains of Bacillus cereus were isolated during presumptive plate-counts from 18 groups of industrialized, non-industrialized, crude or cooked food, belonging to 10 separate classes. Specific presumptive counts ranged from 10(2) to 6 X 10(3)/g or ml. Among these isolates, 13 strains were derived from 3 outbreaks of food poisoning (involving a minimum of 57 people), as determined by the assayed bacteriological quality of the ingested foods. As an adopted procedure to correlate toxicity and ability to promote illness in man, culture fluids of all strains were assayed to determine their ability to increase vascular permeability (APC) to cause necrosis in rabbits skin and to kill albino mice. APC was positive in 86.85% of the 114 strains, death of albino mice occurred in 65.79% and a combination of APC and death was observed in 59.65%. APC plus necrosis, or only necrosis, occurred with 34.21% of the culture fluids. Death, APC and death with or without necrosis, were demonstrated in the strains implicated with illness. This confirmed the known individuality of action exhibited by certain B. cereus food-borne toxigenic factors. The low presumptive counts of this bacterium in the order of 10(2)-10(3)/g or ml found in food, implicated or not with illness, suggests that the recommended number of B. cereus per g or ml of food sample should be reevaluated in our country. Furthermore, a wider range of food should be brought under bacteriological sanitary control for this species.

Dosou-se a atividade da GOT, GPT e ceruloplasmina no testículo de ratos normais (a atividade testicular destas enzimas é relativamente baixa) e injetados com cloreto de cádmio ( que lesa o testículo), assim como em animais com este órgão lesado e que se administrou testosterona, estradiol, progesterona e gonadotrofina coriônica. Pudemos observar alterações significativas das enzimas por ação destes diferentes hormônios. Infelizmente, como pouco se sabe sobre a função destas enzimas neste órgão, torna-se difícil interpretar os nossos achados.
GOT, GPT and ceruloplasmin activities have been determined in testicle of normal rats. Low activities were found for every enzyme. In animals injected with cadmium chloride, there were significant alterations in enzyme activities. Accentuated alterations in enzyme activities were also found in animals with destroyed testicles after injection of several hormones (testosterone, estradiol, progesterone and chorionic gonadotrophin)

TRH was studied in rats with chronic Chagas disease. It was found an increased secretion of TSH 60 minutes after intraperitoneal injection of the hypothalamic hormone. T3 and T4 were also decreased in basal conditions. This may indicate a primary hypothyroidism.