METACHROMATIC BODIES IN THE BRAIN

Abstract

The mucin or mucin-like metachromatic substance sometimes found in the white matter of the brain was observed in a case of Huntington''s chorea and in the brains of 2 horses dying of grass sickness. They exhibit a variety of staining reactions which vary both with the stain and the method of preparation. They take basic stains and do not give the stain reactions of fat, glycogen or amyloid. Alcohol is required to give them definite form. No variation of fixation can produce them as artifacts. Cause of death, condition before death, age and "species specificity" cannot be related to their presence. They are derived from myelin or the ground substance of the brain, their staining reactions resembling those of the polysaccharides or their derivatives. In "normal" control human or horse brains metachromatic bodies were either rare or markedly less frequent than in affected brains.