Complex extracts from human biological

Reduction of Data from the Automated Gas-Liquid Chromatographic Analysis of Complex Extracts from Human Biological Fluids Using a Digital Electronic Integrator and on Off-Line Computer Programs... 

Healy, M.J.R., Chalmers, R.A. and Watts, R.W.E. (1973), Reduction of data from the automated gas-liquid chromatographic analysis of complex extracts from human biological fluids using a digital electronic integrator and an off-line computer programme. J. Chromatogr., 87,365. 

In 1959 Bettex-Galland and Liischer succeeded in extracting from human blood platelets such a (iontractile protein, which was subsecpiently named thrombosthenin. Its solubility properties, as well as its dependence for activity on the presence of ATP and metal ions, soon led to its classification as a member of the actomyosin group. Work on thrombosthenin has since continued, both with respect to its properties as a complex protein with enzymatic activity and to its biological significance. 

Details about structure, biosynthesis, and classification of phenolics are described in the other chapters in this handbook. Plant phenolics have a distinctive ability to form non-covalent, intermolecular complexes with each other and with both large and small molecules. Recognition of the antioxidant activities of many polyphenols has established correlation with the health benefits by such compounds [34]. This leads to the development of commercial products containing free-radical-scavenging phytochemical mixtures, for example, Pycnogenol (procyanidin extracted from Pinus maritima). Table 82.2 represents a list of polyphenolic compounds used in nutraceuticals and their biologic effects on human health. 

As has been described above, HA is an essential functional component of almost all tissues in the vertebrate organism. Thus, various animal tissues - e.g. rooster combs, shark skin, bovine eyeballs - have been used as sources of isolation and production of high molar mass HAs. Since in the biological materials HA is usually present in a complex linked to other biopolymers, several separation procedures have to be applied in order to obtain a pure compound, such as protease digestion, HA ion-pair precipitation (with e.g. cetylpyridinium chloride), membrane ultrafiltration, HA non-solvent precipitation and/or lyophilization [135,136]. The mean molar mass of the commercially available extractive HA preparations obtained from animal tissues is mostly in the range from several hundred thousands Da up to approximately 2.5 MDa. To date, the demand for HA materials approved for applications in human medicine has been satisfied by high molar mass HAs prepared from the rooster combs. For example, Healon (Pharmacia Upjohn, Inc., Peapack, NJ, USA) - used in viscosurgery at eye implant insertion - has a mean HA molar mass of about 2.5 MDa. 

Other Metal-Peptide and -Protein Interactions.—The determination of protein-bound trace elements in biological material by neutron activation analysis has been described Zn, Hg, Cu, and Se were accurately detected in human liver samples, provided that most of the element concerned was protein bound. An interaction of mercury with a protein or a protein-DNA complex has been invoked to explain the partitioning of the metal in euchromatin over heterochromatin (from mouse liver nuclei) by a 10 1 ratio. " Bovine retinas, isolated rod outer segments and emul-phogene extracts of rod outer segments have been shown to contain appreciable amounts of Zn ", Ca and the zinc levels being light sensitive. 

Since wood and coal tar creosotes are complex mixtures, techniques for relating apparent bioaccumulation or biomagnification in food chains to human health concerns are not well defined. Fish or shellfish directly exposed to coal tar creosote wastes will be tainted by offensive odors and tastes. Extracts of shellfish taken from the wharf of the biological station in St. Andrews and from Passamaquoddy Bay (both in New Brunswick, Canada) indicated contamination with creosote oil (Zitko 1975). Concentrations of creosote oil found were as follows ... 

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