Use of electrophoretic techniques and specific antibodies to analyse tubulin isotypes in rabbit testis and...

Multiple tubulin isotypes have been described in vertebrate cells and they are known to be tissue specific (Cleveland and Sullivan, 1985; Cowan and Dudley, 1983). In this study, tubulin heterogeneity has been analysed in rabbit testis and spermatozoa by isoelectric focusing, two dimensional electrophoresis and immunoblotting performed using antibodies with different specificities. These biochemical techniques evidenced a small number of tubulin isotypes expressed by immature testis and fully maturated testis and spermatozoa of rabbit, and showed that the alpha isotypes are less acidic than the beta ones and present the post-translational detyrosinated form.