Mucus Glycoprotein Content of Chronic Bronchitis Sputum 1

Abstract

Summary

When solubilized with mercap-toethanol and subjected to gel filtration on Sepharose 4B, sputum from patients with chronic bronchitis consistently yielded an elution pattern in which a portion of the mucus glycoproteins emerged in a fraction of very large molecular size excluded from the gel, but most emerged later in a portion of smaller molecular size retarded in the column. The concentration of the mucus glycoprotein fraction of lower molecular size increased in proportion to the content of total solids in the chronic bronchitis sputum. The elution pattern obtained with induced sputum from normal subjects differed in having relatively little of the smaller-molecular-size mucus glycoprotein fraction. Thus, the chronic bronchitis sputum was characterized by a higher total content of mucus glycoproteins than the sputum from the normal subjects, and the increase was due to a large increase in the content of the mucus glycoproteins of smaller molecular size.