Isolation of alpha- and beta-subunits of peak-I hCG and generation of highly specific polyclonal antisera.

Development of polyclonal antisera is still a choice in some hard-pressed budget laboratories. In the present study, an attempt was made to isolate alpha- and beta-subunits from peak-I hCG, generation of polyclonal antisera and their characterization. The anti-hCG-a antisera showed titres of 1: 8000 and anti-hCG-beta antisera 1: 16,000 at 50% binding to radiolabelled hCG in RIA.

Isolation of hCG and its characterization by radioimmunoassay, enzyme-immunoassay, and radio-receptor assay.

The nature of human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) molecules present during early pregnancy of Indian women is poorly understood. Therefore, a study has been undertaken to isolate hCG and characterize different forms of hCG from urine. The hCG molecules from urine of pregnant women (45-75 days post LMP) were adsorbed onto kaolin, eluted with ammonium hydroxide, and precipitated using acetone and then lyophilized.

Rat prostatic inhibin: less than 35 kDa protein(s).

An attempt was made to purify and physicochemically characterize the inhibin-like activity of rat ventral prostate based on the technique of immunosorption. It was possible to partially purify prostatic inhibin by affinity chromatography and the molecular size of inhibin-like material was shown to be less than 35 kDa.

Mode of action of inhibin-like pineal antigonadotropin is different from melatonin during compensatory ovarian hypertrophy.

Both melatonin and pineal antigonadotropic peptides have the same end effect, i.e., prevention of the hypertrophic response when tested in the conventional compensatory ovarian hypertrophy (COH) model.

Interrelationship between ovine follicular fluid inhibin and serum albumin.

Ovine follicular fluid inhibin (oFF-I) as isolated in this laboratory, proved to be a monomeric protein (M(r).65 kDa). It was found to share very many of the physico-chemical characteristics of ovine serum albumin (oSA)-such as molecular size, iso-electric point, N-terminal aminoacid, finger-print patterns following enzymatic or cyanogen bromide cleavage, as well as binding of estradiol-17 beta and tryptophan.