Experimental ulcerative disease of the colon in animals.

Until recent years, there have been few successful attempts to produce experimental ulcerative disease of the colon. Several methods, including the injection of cholinergic and adrenergic drugs, the prolonged administration of histamine and histamine-releasers, the local injection of collagenase, the oral or intraarterial administration of lysozyme, as well as immunological procedures, have been used to produce experimental 'colitis' in various animal species, but the significance of these reactions in relation to the clinical condition in man remains in doubt'. Of considerable interest from the immunological aspect is the work of Zweibaum, Morard, and Halpern2. They immunized rats with living E. coli injected subcutaneously in Freund's adjuvant and produced a form of haemorrhagic ulcerative 'colitis', which they considered as being very similar to human ulcerative colitis in its symptoms, course, and histological characteristics.