Purification and characterization of cardiac tropomyosins

A new procedure was developed to purify tropomyosin. The procedure was an adaptation of that described for purification of myosin. By eliminating troponin before precipitating with (NH4)2 SO4, it was possible to obtain pure tropomyosin from the same preparation from which myosin was purified. When tropomyosin was subjected to isoelectrofocusing two tropomyosins were present, having similar isoelectric points of pH 5.4 and 5.6; two tropomyosin subunits were resolved in the presence of 6 M urea. The two subunits had very similar isoelectric points, pH 4.7 and 5.0. According to Ouchterlony analyses the tropomyosins from canine skeletal and cardiac tissue were immunologically identical when incubated with goat gammaG antitropomyosin (cardiac).