Faculty Bibliography

Because interleukin-2 is so costly, the trial is being kept very small, Dr. [Anthony S. Fauci] said. It was undertaken after test-tube experiments by Dr. Fauci and other researchers at the National Institutes of Health and the Food and Drug Administration showed that interleukin-2 enhanced the infection-fighting activity of certain cells in blood from AIDS patients. Results of the study were presented yesterday at a virology meeting in East Lansing, Mich., by Dr. Alain H. Rook, a researcher for the food and drug agency. In the laboratory study described at the Michigan meeting, by the lymphocytes from six homosexuals who had AIDS and an active cytomegalovirus infection, and those from uninfected heterosexuals were incubated with interleukin-2 or interferon. As expected, both interferon and interleukin-2 enhanced natural killer cell activity of the lymphocytes from normal subjects, and these lymphocytes exhibited virus specific killer cell activity without treatment, according to Dr. Rook's report. Interferon, however, enhanced natural killer cell activity in blood from only one AIDS patient and failed to produce changes in virus specific killer cells in in blood from any of the AIDS patients. But exposure to interleukin-2 significantly enhanced both the natural killer and virus specific killer cell activity of the lymphocytes from all six patients

Rheumatic fever serves as an example. Rheumatic fever is an inflammatory reaction that can affect the joints and heart as a complication of streptococcal infections. Doctors came to understand the frequency of rheumatic heart disease only from a 20-year followup study of rheumatic fever patients. Moreover, it was only by following a large population for many years that doctors learned that rheumatic fever could result from silent infections as well as from the classic ''strep'' sore throats. Doctors now consider the incubation period of AIDS to range from 6 to 18 months, with a mean duration of 14 months. That is just one of the reasons why scientists have to consider virtually every known group of microbes in seeking the cause of AIDS. However, if scientists knew that the range of the incubation period was much narrower, then they could sharpen the focus of their searches in the laboratory to the microbial agents that have shorter incubation periods. Or, if studies of the natural history of AIDS show that its incubation period is truly as long as 18 months, scientists may have to devote even more attention to the so-called slow virus group than they are doing now. ''Narrowing that latent period could be very important in research on AIDS,'' Dr. [Richard M. Krause] said. Then he added, ''But unless we do some extensive, long-term and expensive studies, we are not going to be able to figure that out.''

In a textbook on surgery written in 1927, Dr. Walter Hughson described the hazards: ''The safety razor has largely supplanted the ordinary steel razor, and few people are qualified to use this oldfashioned razor either safely or well. Surprisingly few interns or students know how to manipulate a razor properly, and none know how to sharpen a dulled edge. The result is frequently disastrous. The patient presents for operation with a field scarred and scratched and possibly bleeding, a condition much worse than the original one of hair.'' Shaving can also be just another personal indignity the patient must undergo. In 1961, Dr. J. Russell Elkinton, then the editor of the Annals of Internal Medicine, described his experience before a hernia operation: ''Few procedures, short of the scheduled surgery, require greater trust in the manual dexterity of one's fellow man as he, the orderly, wields the razor around one's most vulnerable parts.'' Some depilatories work by breaking the chemical bonds between sulfur atoms, changing the structure of the keratin component of hair. Regrowth of hair is reported as full and complete. Moreover, because the tip of the growing hair is softly pointed after depilatories, regrowth is not as uncomfortable and itchy as when the firm, chisel-edged hairs regrow after shaving. Further, the application of depilatories can be cheaper than shaving, in part because patients can apply the ointments themselves

It was a relatively new sophisticated molecular biological test depending on an enzyme called restriction endonuclease that cleaves the virus to produce specific fingerprints that led the Einstein-Montefiore researchers to an important aspect of the finding - identifying the adenoviruses as type 35. There are 41 different types of adenoviruses. Dr. [Marshall S. Horwitz] said the fact that these particular adenoviruses were related ''would have been missed if the samples were sent to a laboratory'' where only standard tests were done. ''Because advenoviruses have not been recognized as being associated with AIDS at all, these first isolates are worthy of considerable attention,'' Dr. Horwitz said. ''Obviously we have to look at larger numbers to see if what we found in 20 patients will hold up, and in addition we have to find out what the virus was doing there.'' Dr. Horwitz said his team was expecting to receive samples from England as part of its continuing studies to determine whether there was a geographical pattern to infections with adenovirus 35. AIDS cases have been reported from England as well as in Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, and West Germany. West Germany has reported 24 confirmed and 100 suspect cases of AIDS, including six deaths

His mother's personal tragedy deeply affected him, and as a young man he considered himself ''lucky to see what happens with abuse of alcohol and drugs.'' ''By God,'' he told himself, ''this won't happen to me.'' ''I took one that night and had the best sleep I'd had in years,'' Dr. Farley said. When he went to the operating room the next day, he was pleased. He had been concerned that his image as a physician was tarnished by a chronic nervous tremor that had made his hands shake. ''It got worse when I knew people were watching me, and I knew patients were getting scared when I tried to insert an intravenous needle with my hands shaking,'' Dr. Farley said. But with Placidyl not only was the shaking gone, but also ''it gave me a tremendous sense of confidence, that I could do anything in the operating room and could start an intravenous on anyone,'' he said. ''This is the time for me to stop, I thought,'' Dr. Farley said. ''So I didn't take any pills with me - the first time in 17 years. If I had any withdrawal symptoms while at the meeting, I knew I could drink freely. But I didn't have any withdrawal and I didn't drink very much.''

When the London researchers examined specimens from women who did not have toxemia of pregnancy, they found that all showed ''organisms'' identical to those described by the Illinois researchers. The London team also found the ''organisms'' in all of a series of blood samples from nonpregnant women as well as men. The London researchers concluded that ''clearly these organisms are artifacts,'' a term used by scientists to describe an irrelevant finding produced by the conditions of the experiment but having nothing to do with actual biological phenomenon at issue. The London researchers said the artifact was ''produced by the preliminary sulfation.''

Kaposi's sarcoma, a type of skin cancer, has been diagnosed frequently among AIDS victims. From the beginning, elements of the AIDS problem seemed to have roots in Africa, where a so-called ''Kaposi's sarcoma belt'' extends from Zaire to Kenya. For unknown reasons, Kaposi's sarcoma accounts for 9 percent of all cancers in the black population of that area, but it is rare among American blacks. At least two scientific groups have failed to find evidence supporting Dr. Teas's suggestion. Scientists from the United States Department of Agriculture's Plum Island facility off Long Island have tested blood samples from about 30 AIDS victims and found no evidence of African swine fever virus infection, according to Dr. Jerry J. Callis who directs the Plum Island unit. And in the May 14 issue of The Lancet, a team of Belgian and Dutch scientists reported testing samples from seven AIDS patients without finding evidence of swine fever infection. They said their results made it unlikely that the swine fever virus and AIDS would be found to be related. It should be noted that one American health official has given high marks to the accomplishments of Haitian doctors in their country. ''The Haitians were concerned that they were being blamed,'' he said, ''but they've done a remarkable amount of work.''

Dr. [Albert Claude] was the first scientist to apply the electron microscope to the study of cells. The instrument had been used by physicists and metallurgists, but Dr. Claude saw its potential and worked to find ways of preparing delicate cells to withstand the high vacuum and electron bombardment the microscope creates. In 1945 he published the first detailed view of cell anatomy. The three scientists and their colleagues discovered and learned the function of such cell constituents as ribosomes and lysosomes. Dr. Claude discovered a number of subcellular structures such as mitochondria, which store the cell's energy. Dr. Claude and his co-workers transformed man's view of the cell from a blurry perception of a tiny blob to a highly detailed understanding that cells are miniature organisms equipped with a variety of specialized internal organs, or organelles, as they are called. Cited for Wartime Valor

None of the women had any of the known risk factors. None were Haitian and none had hemophilia. They were 23 to 39 years old. ''The only common risk factor we could identify was prolonged monogamous contact'' with a male AIDS patient, Dr. [Carol Harris]'s team reported. Dr. [James Curran] cautioned that the new findings did not necessarily mean that the seven women were infected specifically by sexual contact. Dr. Curran said: ''They could have gotten it by sharing razors or something else. It is known that wives and husbands of hepatitis B carriers have higher rates of hepatitis B infection than other family members do. This may be something like that.'' ---- Social Security Responds ''Given the high mortality rate, we felt it appropriate to go ahead where we've got a documented case,'' said Jean Hinckley, deputy director of Social Security's office of disability programs

Called ''Physician's Journal Club,'' the program will review scientific reports and other articles published in medical journals. In addition to Dr. [Art Ulene], two other network officials, Dr. Tom Rockwell and Dr. Lawrence D. Grouse, will appear on the program. Although the program will be aimed exclusively at physicians, Dr. Ulene said, ''No question, there will be eavesdropping by lay people.'' The program will be telecast at 10 A.M. Wednesdays, then, beginning in September, it will be telecast four times a week, with the additional programs at 11 A.M. on Saturdays and at 10 A.M. and 9 P.M. on Sundays