Micro-scale two-dimensional electrophoresis of alkaline phosphatase from serum

Isoenzymes of alkaline phosphatase (EC 3.1.3.1) were separated by micro-scale two-dimensional electrophoresis, with isoelectric focusing in capillary gels in the first dimension and polyacrylamide gradient-gel electrophoresis in the second. The isoenzymes detected were identified by several treatments--e.g., incubation with sialidase, papain, Triton X-100, and wheat-germ agglutinin--and by comparison with alkaline phosphatase from liver microsomes. Liver and bone isoforms in normal sera showed overlapping isoelectric points but differed in molecular mass, estimated as 172 and 185 kDa, respectively. Sera of patients with liver disease showed several additional groups of alkaline phosphatase isoforms, two of which were found to consist of multi-molecular complexes. Others probably correspond to incompletely glycated enzyme proteins. A further isoform with a mass of about 250 kDa does not seem to correspond to any known isoform of alkaline phosphatase in serum. With this technique, we demonstrated intra- and interindividual variations of the placental alkaline phosphatase isoenzyme in pregnancy sera.