Clinical Chemistry, Vol 1, 180-189, Copyright © 1955 by the American Association for Clinical Chemistry

Effect of Shaking on the Accuracy of Salt Fractionation Methods For Serum Albumin

¹ Biochemistry Department, Division of Laboratories, Jewish Chronic Disease Hospital, Brooklyn, N. Y.

1. The important factors causing albumin denaturation in the presence of sodium sulfite when shaking with ether or ether-Span, are the method and time of shaking, and the free air space available for shaking.

2. Gentle inversion with ether-Span for 30 seconds or less, and a free air space of about 1.3 cm.₃ gave results with the Wolfson-Cohn procedure (10) which were in close agreement with the electrophoretic method in 42 normal and pathologic sera.

3. There is little or no albumin denaturation from shaking with ether in the presence of 21.2% sodium sulfate as used in the procedure of Wolfson-Cohn (10)for albumin plus -globulins.

Note:

The authors wish to acknowledge the aid of Dr. Bruno W. Volk, Director of Laboratories, who permitted part of the experimental work in this paper to be performed under Grant No. B-285 of the U. S. Public Health Service dealing with the general subject of "Protein Studies in Chronic Diseases." We also wish to thank Miss Renee Eisner for editing and typing the manuscript.