Abstract
IN the genus Macaca, rhesus monkeys show a remarkable polymorphism of transferrin, the iron-binding protein, whereas cynomolgus monkeys (the Philippines variety) show only one molecular form of the protein1,2. Two-dimensional starch-gel immunoelectrophoresis3 was used in previous work1,2 to determine (with the aid of a uni-specific chicken anti-human transferrin serum) the number of transferrin components in the macaque sera. Then comparative one-dimensional starch-gel electrophoresis in the tris discontinuous buffer system was used to establish the subtle differences in the mobilities of transferrin, and fifteen phenotypes2 due to various combinations of eight molecular forms of the protein were detected among rhesus monkeys. These results have now been confirmed by determinations based on the iron-binding property of transferrin. We have also adopted a provisional letter system of nomenclature which has simplified identification of the macaque transferrin phenotypes, thereby making it easier to discover new phenotypes. In this connexion a re-examination of the rhesus sera and an examination of sera from additional macaque species have now revealed nineteen transferrin phenotypes, sixteen being present in the rhesus group alone.
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References
Goodman, M., and Poulik, E., Nature, 190, 171 (1961).
Goodman, M., Human Biology, 33, 131 (1961).
Poulik, M. D., J. Immunol., 82, 502 (1959).
Smithies, O., Biochem. J., 71, 585 (1959).
Giblett, E. R., Hickman, C. G., and Smithies, O., Nature, 183, 1589 (1959).
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GOODMAN, M., POULIK, E. Serum Transferrins in the Genus Macaca: Species Distribution of Nineteen Phenotypes. Nature 191, 1407–1408 (1961). https://doi.org/10.1038/1911407a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/1911407a0
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