Quantitation of keratan sulfate in the presence of other corneal glycosaminoglycans

✍ Scribed by Bernard Wortman

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 1962
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 351 KB
• Volume: 4
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0003-2697
• DOI: 10.1016/0003-2697(62)90013-1

✦ Synopsis

At least half of the glycosaminoglycans of connective tissues such as cornea and nucleus pulposus is composed of keratan sulfate. The amount of keratan sulfate present in cartilage is found to increase with age of the animal (1) and is closely associated with the chondroitin sulfateprotein complex (2,3). Keratan sulfate has not been found to exist in the absence of other glycosaminoglycans in any single tissue. Therefore, studies of keratan sulfate can be complicated by the presence of other glycosaminoglycans and by its interaction with other polysaccharideprotein complexes. The study of keratan sulfate metabolism (4) could be facilitated if there were available a simple calorimetric method for its detection in the presence of cornea1 glycosaminoglycans.

The availability of ion exchangers (5,6) and methods for determining hexoses (7) suggested that it would be feasible to devise simple calorimetric techniques which would permit the quantitation of uranic acid-deficient glycosaminoglycans in the presence of other forms. The cornea has been select.ed to demonstrate the feasibility of these techniques.