New Type of Exfoliatin Obtained from Staphylococcal Strains, Belonging to Phage Groups Other than Group II, Isolated from Patients with Impetigo and Ritter's Disease

ABSTRACT

Four strains of Staphylococcus aureus of a phage type other than the second group, isolated from patients with impetigo and Ritter's disease, were found to produce an exotoxin similar to those reported by Melish et al. (1972), Kapral and Miller (1971), and Arbuthnott et al. (1973). This toxin could elicit a general exfoliation of the epidermis with the so-called Nikolsky sign when subcutaneously inoculated into neonatal mice within 4 days after birth. The new toxin was serologically different from exfoliatin produced by the phage group II staphylococci previously reported (Kondo et al., 1973) and showed an electrophoretic pattern corresponding to that of the B-type toxin of the latter in acrylamide disc electrophoresis. It had the same molecular weight as that of the latter, which was estimated to be about 24,000. It was thermolabile and lost its toxic activity by heating at 60 C for 30 min; in addition, most of the toxicity was lost within 1 month of storage even at −30 C. We propose to designate the old typical heat-stable exfoliatin as S. aureus exfoliatin A and the new heat-susceptible exfoliatin as S. aureus exfoliatin B.