Relation of age to isoenzyme pattern and total activity of amylase in serum

Pancreatic and salivary isoenzymes of amylase were determined in serum from 70 subjects. Thin-layer gel/isoelectric focusing was used to separate the isoenzymes. Because other studies (J. Lab. Clin. Med. 90: 141-151, 1977) show that the major isoamylases have isoelectric points between 5.8 and 7.2, we focused the sera on polyacrylamide gel plates with a pH gradient from 5.5 to 8.5. The separated amylase fractions were made visible by direct incubation with a commercially available dye-starch polymer. Isoelectric focusing proved to be convenient, precise, and reproducible, and it can be used as a routine analysis to detect even slight changes in serum amylase distributions. We found that the isoamylase distribution is age dependent, whereas total amylase activity shows no correlation with age.