Isolation and some properties of mammalian hepatic membrane lectins

Membrane lectins were isolated from sheep, goat, and buffalo liver by chromatography on an asialofetuin (ASF)‐Sepharose 4B column. The lectins moved as a single protein band in SDS‐PAGE with molecular masses of 42, 54 and 50 kDa, respectively, for sheep, goat and buffalo lectins. The molecular masses remained unchanged in 0.2 M 2‐mercaptoethanol. As judged from the inhibition of binding of the lectin to ASF gel, the three lectins were β‐galactoside‐specific. Sheep, goat and buffalo lectins were found to be sialoglycoproteins containing 18.6, 27 and 38.8 mol/mol lectin of neutral hexose, respectively; the corresponding values for the sialic acid content being 5.3, 8.7 and 11.8 mol/mol lectin. Thus goat and buffalo lectins are physico‐chemically different from many mammalian hepatic lectins described so far.