Purification of Clostridium botulinum type G progenitor toxin

Abstract

Clostridium botulinum type G cultured for 6 days at 30 degrees C in proteose peptone-yeast extract-glucose medium produced toxin of 1.3 x 10(4) LD50/ml. The toxin was precipitated at pH 4.0, extracted with 0.2 M phosphate buffer, pH 6.0, and activated with trypsin. Sonic treatment and trypsinization of the residual precipitate released additional toxin, the toxicity of which corresponded to that detected in whole culture. Activated toxin obtained from the first extract and that from the residual precipitate were combined and purified by salting out, acid precipitation, gel filtration on Sephadex G-200, chromatography on SP-Sephadex, and a second gel filtration on Sephadex G-200. The yield of purified toxin from 10 liters of culture was 22.9 mg an 1.1 X 10(8) mouse ip LD50 with a specific toxicity of 3.0 X 10(7) mouse ip LD50/mg nitrogen. The molecular weight of the toxin was about 500,000, corresponding to that of L toxin of the other types. No M nor LL toxin was detected.