A Cellulose Acetate Membrane Technique for the Determination of Adenylate Kinase Types in Bloodstains

Abstract

Abstract The genetically determined isoenzyme blood group system of adenylate kinase (AK) has been demonstrated in lysates of human erythrocytes [1,2] and in bloodstains [3]. The technique employed was horizontal starch gel electrophoresis using either a discontinuous histidine-citrate [1], a phosphate [2], or a succinate [4] buffer system. Since then, electrophoresis on cellulose acetate membrane (CAM) has been introduced as a rapid technique for the determination of AK types in fresh lysates [5,6]. We decided to investigate the use of CAM for determining AK types in bloodstains. In preliminary tests with CAM, we found the discontinuous histidine-citrate buffer system [1,5] gave clear results with lysates, but unsatisfactory results with even fresh bloodstain material. The phosphate buffer [6,7] seemed more promising and this paper describes our evaluation and adaptation of the phosphate system for bloodstain samples.