Author:

Keywords:

Acromegaly, Animals, Chromatography, Gel, Diabetes Mellitus, Dogs, Female, Fetal Blood, Growth Hormone, Guinea Pigs, Humans, Iodine Radioisotopes, Pituitary Gland, Pregnancy, Radioimmunoassay, Rats, 1103 Clinical Sciences, Endocrinology & Metabolism, 3202 Clinical sciences

Abstract:

The heterogeneity of human growth hormone (HGH) in serum was studied by gel filtration on Sephadex G 75 and subsequent radioimmunoassay. With small columns only two fractions of growth hormone immunoreactivity could be detected. With better separation, however, on larger columns of Sephadex G 75 three growth hormone fractions were found. The macromolecular 'big big' HGH and 'big' HGH, with a molecular weight about twice that of 'little' HGH represented between 4 and 39% of the total immunoreactivity. There was no systematic difference in growth hormone heterogeneity between sera from normal persons or sera from umbilical cord of normal children or children from diabetic mothers. Acromegalic sera contained normal to lower relative concentrations of the bigger fractions.