Confirmation of the successful cultivation of Treponema pallidum in tissue culture.

Following the procedure of Fieldsteel et al. (1981) we have confirmed the ability of Treponema pallidum to replicate in monolayer cultures of cottontail rabbit epithelium cells. Up to a 24-fold increase in the number of organisms was observed in nine days with 87% viability. Successful growth of T. pallidum dependend on maintaining the rabbit cells at a temperature above 33 degrees C.