The sulphur balance in wool

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Abstract
The cystine, cysteine and total S contents of a sample of Australian 64S quality Merino wool have been determined by several different methods. The colorimet-ric method for the determination of cystine in hydrolysates gives low results. This can be partially explained by the presence in the hydrolysate of decomposition products of cystine which give smaller colour yields than cystine, and by loss of volatile decomposition products. A radiometric method for the determination of cystine plus cysteine allows correction to be made for loss of cystine during hydrolysis. The polarographic determination of cystine and cysteine in intact wool can, with certain interpretations of the data, give results in agreement with the radiometric method. However, these interpretations are not unambiguous. Three different and precise methods for total S gave significantly different results. The mean value found, 3.66 [plus or minus] 0.12%, is close to the sum of the best values for cystine S, cysteine S and methionine S.