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. 1980 Mar 1;185(3):639–645. doi: 10.1042/bj1850639

A biochemical comparison of normal human liver and hepatocellular carcinoma ferritins.

S Bullock, A Bomford, R Williams
PMCID: PMC1161441  PMID: 6248028

Abstract

1. The iron contents, gel migration rates and isoelectric-focusing patterns of normal liver and hepatocellular carcinoma ferritins from the same patients were compared. 2. Sucrose-density-gradient centrifugation showed that the number of iron atoms per ferritin molecule was decreased to approximately half in carcinoma tissue when compared with normal liver. 3. On electrophoresis, hepatocellular carcinoma ferritin migrates faster and is therefore more negatively charged than normal liver ferritin, thus refuting the general view that the more negatively charged a ferritin molecule the greater its iron content. 4. Comparison of tumour and normal liver ferritin subunit compositions on acid/urea/polyacrylamide gels showed hepatocellular carcinoma ferritin to contain an additional, more negatively charged, subunit to normal liver ferritin. 5. Isoelectric focusing showed that hepatocellular carcinoma tissue contains isoferritins with isoelectric points intermediate between the ranges of normal liver and normal heart isoferritins.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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