Protein analysis of monkey aqueous humor

Aqueous humor from individual eyes of young monkeys (Macaca mulatta) was analyzed by gel exclusion chromatography, and one- and two-dimensional gel electrophoresis. The data indicated that in young normal monkey the main peak of protein eluting from gel exclusion columns was observed around 80,000 daltons. There was a small amount of heavy molecular weight material eluting from these columns with an apparent molecular size of greater than 500,000 daltons, but very little material smaller than 40,000 daltons. By one- and two-dimensional gel electrophoresis, the major polypeptide components in the monkey aqueous were similar to those reported for the human aqueous with polypeptides at around 170, 130, 110, 80, 67, 60, 42, 34, 28, 25, 22, 16, and 14 kilodaltons (kD). The monkey aqueous humor also contains the protease inhibitor cystatin.