The state of water in normal human, bird and fish eye lenses

Abstract

The state of water was studied in normal human, fish and bird eye lenses. Free induction decay as well as nuclear spin-lattice and nuclear spin-spin relaxation time measurements were carried out by NMR method. The amount of non-freezable water per unit protein quantity was determined and the activation energy of the motion of the water molecules responsible for the relaxation was estimated. These results were compared with the ideas of Kuch and Yu concerning difference in protein conformation of the lens crystallins.