Table 1. Peptides tested in this study for their crystallin aggregation properties.

Peptide	Sequence	Whether present in the lens	Amount of human lens proteins precipitated by the peptide (µg)
αA-(1-14)	CH3-MDVTIQHPWFKRTL	Yes	11
αA-(67-75)	DRDKFVIFL	Yes	142
αA-(66-75)	SDRDKFVIFL	Yes	44
αA-(66-80)	SDRDKFVIFLDVKHF	Yes	139
αA-(66-80-Pro)	SDRDKFPIFLDVKHF	No	14
αA-(66-80-Ala)	SDRDKFAIFLDVKHF	No	103
αA-(66-80-Scr)	FKISDHFKDVFRDVL	No	19

Water-soluble extract (2 mg) from 35-year-old human lens was incubated in 50 mM phosphate buffer, pH 7.2 at 37°C for 24 h in the presence or absence of various peptides (25 µg). The precipitate formed was collected by centrifugation at 1000× g for 10 min and dissolved in buffer containing 7 M urea and the amount of protein was estimated by Bio-Rad protein assay method. The values are an average of two independent experiments. Lens extract alone showed the precipitation of ∼12 µg of proteins after 24 h of incubation. Bold letters in sequence represent substitutions.