Separation of pineal extracts on sephadex G-10. I. A spectrofluorimetric study of indoles in a cockerel pineal extract.

Abstract

It is possible to separate an aqueous extract of cockerel pineal bodies, resp. cockerel cerebral cortex, on a Sephadex G-10 column, resulting in several distinct fluorescence peaks, which show an excitation and a fluorescence maximum like indoles. A comparison of pineal extract and cerebral cortex, separated on the same Sephadex column (143×1 cm), pretreated with a pyridine-acetate buffer pH 5.8, equilibrated and eluted with 0.01 N NaOH, shows that in cockerel pineal extract three peaks can be distinguished, which cannot be observed in the same quantity of cockerel cerebral cortex. Further experiments are in progress to study the above mentioned fluorescent substances of the peaks I, II and III, present in cockerel pineal extract. Attempts are also made to make this method suitable for physiological experiments.