Duck Immunoglobulins

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Abstract
Summary: Investigation of the sera from three species of duck has demonstrated the presence of two major low molecular weight γ-globulins, a 7.8S and a 5.7S protein. The 7.8S protein shows similarities to mammalian γG-globulins when products of reduction and enzymatic cleavage were investigated. The 5.7S γ-globulin had several interesting characteristics. It lacked certain antigenic determinants of the Fc fragment that were present on the 7.8S protein, yet had no detectable unique antigens to suggest it contained structural components that differed significantly from those found on the 7.8S protein. Gel filtration of the peptide chains indicated that the 5.7S protein had a smaller heavy chain than that of the duck 7.8S γ-globulin or mammalian γG-globulin. Also, reduction in the absence of denaturing agents caused a decrease in S rate from 5.7S to 3.5S. These data suggested that the duck 5.7S immunoglobulin lacked a considerable segment of the Fc fragment of the heavy chain. As a result of this, inter-H chain non-covalent bonds were sufficiently small in number so that reduction of the inter-H chain disulfide bond(s) lead to the formation of half molecules.

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