[Electrophoretic variation and specification in different species of anthropoïd apes]

The techniques involved in the measurement of the electrophoretic mobilities of human proteins have been applied for similar protein electrophoretic mobility measurements in various species of anthropoïd apes. A study of the electrophoretic polymorphism in the chimpanzee shows that this species has a similar variability to that of man, although the average individual heterozygosity level is lower. For a certain number of erythrocyte protein loci, the electrophoretic mobilities in man, chimpanzee, and gorilla are about the same. The two types of chimpanzee are distinguished by their distinct allelic forms at the level of only one locus, the transferrin locus. The various sub-species of the common chimpanzee, gorilla, and orang-utan differ at the discriminative post-albumin and transferrin locus, not only in their allelic forms but also in the degree of heterozygoty. A study of such differences enables the proposal of a hypothesis about the relationships between these diverse races. Amongst these, the two sub-species of orang-utan are distinguishable by other diagnostic markers. It would seem that in a study of specific differentiation applicable to that of the human species, the different types of baboons constitute a better model than that of the various anthropoïd apes.