Salmine molecular weight

Problem 36.20 The molecular weight of salmine (see the preceding problem) is about 10,000. What are the actual numbers of the various amino acid residues in salmine that is, what is its molecular formula ... 

Fish sperm contain nucleoprotattiines. Upon treatment with sulfuric acid, the nucleoprotamines are reduced to nucleic acid and protamine sulfate. The chemically heterogeneous protamines of molecular weight 2000-8000 thus obtained contain only a few different kinds of amino acid residues per molecule. They are relatively rich in basic amino acids, as the composition of the protamines clupeine and salmine shows (Table 29-4), and never contain cystine, aspartic acid, or tryptophan. The basic amino acids are responsible for the bonding of the protein to the nucleic acid component. 

During the intervening 40 years the estimation of the molecular weight of unfractionated or whole protamines has been carried out by various chemical and physical methods. Some of these values for typical protamines, clupeine and salmine, are listed in Table V-1 together with the methods used and literature references. 

Molecular Weight Table V-1. The molecular weight of clupeine and salmine ... 

Yamasaki, M. (1) Chemical and enzymic studies on protamines. II. N-Terminal residues and molecular weights of clupeine and salmine. Sci. Pap. Coll. Gen. Educ., Univ. Tokyo 9, 31—47 (1959). 

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