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An antitoxin is an antibody with the ability to neutralize a specific toxin. Antitoxins are produced by certain animals, plants, and bacteria in response to toxin exposure. Although they are most effective in neutralizing toxins, they can also kill bacteria and other microorganisms. Antitoxins are made within organisms, and can be injected into other organisms, including humans, to treat an infectious disease. This procedure involves injecting an animal with a safe amount of a particular toxin. The animal's body then makes the antitoxin needed to neutralize the toxin. Later, blood is withdrawn from the animal. When the antitoxin is obtained from the blood, it is purified and injected into a human or other animal, inducing temporary
passive immunity Passive immunity is the transfer of active humoral immunity of ready-made antibodies. Passive immunity can occur naturally, when maternal antibodies are transferred to the fetus through the placenta, and it can also be induced artificially, when hi ...
. To prevent
serum sickness Serum sickness in humans is a reaction to proteins in antiserum derived from a non-human animal source, occurring 5–10 days after exposure. Symptoms often include a rash, joint pain, fever, and lymphadenopathy. It is a type of hypersensitivity, ...
, it is often best to use an antitoxin obtained from the same species (e.g. use human antitoxin to treat humans). Most antitoxin preparations are prepared from donors with high titers of antibody against the toxin, making them hyperimmune globulins.


History of antitoxin

Antitoxins to diphtheria and tetanus toxins were produced by Emil Adolf von Behring and his colleagues from 1890 onwards. The use of diphtheria antitoxin for the treatment of diphtheria was regarded by '' The Lancet'' as the "most important advance of the
9th 9 (nine) is the natural number following and preceding . Evolution of the Arabic digit In the beginning, various Indians wrote a digit 9 similar in shape to the modern closing question mark without the bottom dot. The Kshatrapa, Andhra and ...
Century in the medical treatment of acute infectious disease". In 1888, Behring was sent to Berlin for a brief service at the Academy for Military Medicine. In 1889, he joined the Institute for Hygiene of the University of Berlin, then headed by
Robert Koch Heinrich Hermann Robert Koch ( , ; 11 December 1843 – 27 May 1910) was a German physician and microbiologist. As the discoverer of the specific causative agents of deadly infectious diseases including tuberculosis, cholera (though the Vibrio ...
. Between 1889 and 1895, Behring developed his pioneering ideas on
serum therapy Antiserum is a blood serum containing monoclonal or polyclonal response, polyclonal antibodies that is used to spread passive immunity to many diseases via blood donation (plasmapheresis). For example, convalescent serum, passive antibody transfu ...
and his theory of antitoxins. Early 1887, in Bonn, Behring had found that the serum of tetanus-immune white rats contained a substance that neutralized anthrax bacilli. He recognized this as the source of their "resistance". On 4 December 1890, Behring and
Kitasato Shibasaburō Baron was a Japanese physician and bacteriologist. He is remembered as the co-discoverer of the infectious agent of bubonic plague in Hong Kong during an outbreak in 1894, almost simultaneously with Alexandre Yersin. Kitasato was nominated ...
published their first paper on blood-serum therapy. On 11 December, another report, signed by Behring, discussed blood-serum therapy not only in the treatment of tetanus, but also in diphtheria. When Paul Ehrlich demonstrated in 1891 that even vegetable poisons led to the formation of antitoxins in an organism, Behring's theory was confirmed. An antitoxin for scarlet fever was developed in 1924, simultaneously by Raymond Dochez and Gladys and
George Frederick Dick George Frederick Dick (July 21, 1881 – October 10, 1967) was an American physician and bacteriologist best known for his work with scarlet fever. Dick studied scarlet fever whilst serving the Army Medical Corps during World War I. Dick con ...
.


21st-century serum therapy


See also

* Toxin-antitoxin system * Vaccination *
Jim (horse) "Jim" was the name of a former milk wagon horse, who was used to produce serum containing diphtheria antitoxin ( antibodies against diphtheria toxin). Jim produced over of diphtheria antitoxin in his career. History On October 2, 1901, Jim show ...
*
Antiserum Antiserum is a blood serum containing monoclonal or polyclonal antibodies that is used to spread passive immunity to many diseases via blood donation (plasmapheresis). For example, convalescent serum, passive antibody transfusion from a previous ...


References


External links

* * {{MeshName, Antitoxins Immune system Immunology