[Urinary excretion of toxic peptides in patients with thermal burns]

A fraction of toxic ninhydrin-positive substances was isolated from urine of healthy persons and of the patients with acute burn toxemia using a multi-step technique, which involved ion exchange chromatography on Dowex resins, gel filtration on Sephadex G-15 and ultrafiltration on Diaflo UM-0.5. The daily excretion of the substances was about 4-fold higher in the patients as compared with healthy persons. The fraction contained basic peptides with molecular masses of 500-2,000 daltons. The total toxicity of these peptide was higher by an order of magnitude in the patients with burns as compared with healthy persons.