Abstract
Antisera produced in rabbits against extracts of cells infected with type 1 or type 2 herpes simplex virus neutralized thymidine kinase activities of six type 1 and six type 2 herpes virus strains. There was intertypic neutralizing activity, suggesting some common antigenic determinants, but much greater intratypic activity, suggesting that the enzyme bears type-specific determinants.
The effects of some anti-type 1 sera were complicated since they also stabilized the type 2 enzyme activity.
When anti-type 1 and anti-type 2 sera were absorbed with extracts of cells infected with thymidine-kinase deficient mutants of homologous type they retained their power to neutralize thymidine kinase activity but completely lost their ability to neutralize infectivity. Each absorbed serum gave a single precipitin line against the parent strain and none against the parent of the other type. It was surmised that these precipitin lines were associated with type-specific thymidine kinase antigens.