ON THE EXISTENCE OF VARIANT FORMS OF GAMMA-GLUTAMYL-TRANSFERASE TRANSFERASE IN REGENERATING AND NEOPLASTIC LIVER

  • 1 January 1981
    • journal article
    • research article
    • Vol. 2  (1-2) , 109-116
Abstract
Variants of gamma-glutamyl transferase (GGT) which may differ in their affinity for concanavalin (Con) A in extracts of fetal, regenerating, neoplastic and normal adult rat liver were identified. GGT activity was low in normal liver and did not increase after partial hepatectomy. Feeding a choline-deficient diet containing 0.05% ethionine caused a large increase in hepatic GGT activity which persisted throughout the feeding period of 23 wk. Practically all of the GGT contained in extracts prepared with Triton X-100 from fetal, regenerating, pre-neoplastic and neoplastic rat liver as well as that from normal adult liver bound to Con A-Sepharose and was eluted from the columns with methyl-.alpha.-D-mannopyranoside. GGT from bovine kidney extracts prepared in an identical way did not bind to Con A-Sepharose. If variants of rat liver GGT exist, they cannot be reliably separated by simple affinity chromatography on Con A-Sepharose or Agarose columns.