Interaction of aluminium ions with some amino acids present in human blood
D Bohrer1, P C do Nascimento, J K A Mendonça
1Departamento de Química, Universidade Federal de Santa Maria, Santa Maria, Brasil. ndenise@quimica.ufsm.br
Abstract:
The interaction of aluminium with some amino acids present in human blood was studied combining ion-chromatography (IC), atomic absorption spectrometry (AAS) and ultrafiltration (UF) techniques. An IC system for simultaneous determination of ornithine, lysine, glutamic acid, aspartic acid and tyrosine was developed. By adding aluminium to standard solutions of the amino acids and keeping the pH at 6 and 7 it was possible to verify that aluminium caused a reduction on the amino acid chromatographic signals. Similar experiment, carried out for copper showed the same behaviour (with different percentage of signal reductions) and validated the results for aluminium, considering that the interaction Cu-amino acid is well-established. The AAS analysis of sample fractions (500 microl) after the IC separation showed that aluminium (as copper as well) is not present in the fractions in which the amino acid peaks appear in the chromatogram. These approaches carried out with serum samples after UF showed that part of the "free" fraction of serum aluminium is distributed, besides other ligands, among these amino acids. It was found that in serum the affinity for aluminium followed the sequence Lys>Orn>Tyr>Glu approximately Asp.
Related Concept Videos
Amino acids
Protein Buffers in Blood Plasma and Cells
Certain amino acids can exist in a zwitterion state at a...
What are Proteins?
EDTA: Chemistry and Properties
EDTA: Auxiliary Complexing Reagents
What are Proteins?

