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[Sialic acid in normal human tears]
Y Nakamura1, N Yokoi, H Tokushige
1Department of Ophthalmology, Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine, Japan.
Purpose:
We measured the concentration of sialic acid, the terminal component of mucin, in normal human tears.
Subjects And Methods:
Tear samples were collected from 31 healthy volunteers(50.7 years old on average) using micropipett after instillation of saline. We investigated the correlation of concentration between glycoprotein and sialic acid, the difference between these in the right eye and left eye, and the reproducibility of the sampling procedure.
Results:
There was significant correlation of concentration between glycoprotein and sialic acid(right eye: r = 0.989, p < 0.0001; left eye: r = 0.988, p < 0.0001). There was no significant difference between these in the right and left eye. Also, the reproducibility was considered acceptable in three measurements of sialic acid with the present procedure. The concentration of sialic acid in normal diluted tears was 37.1 micrograms/ml on average.
Conclusion:
Our data indicates that concentration of sialic acid reflects that of glycoprotein and this method of measurement is applicable to the analysis of disorders with mucin deficiency.