A preliminary report on electrophoretic studies on herring serum proteins

Sera from more than 1 000 specimens of herring from the Norwegian Coast and the North Sea have been analyzed in combined starch-/agar-gel electrophoresis at pH 9.0. Great variations in the serum protein patterns were observed. Especially the transferrin variations (identified by Fe59-autoradiography) were conspicuous. Two transferrin components, either occurring alone or together were found. Also two main albumin components were observed, and they too occurred alone or together. However, the determination of the albumin types were often somewhat unreliable. The variations both in the transferrins and the albumins might be explained by a hypothesis of genetic control involving two allelomorphic genes. Variations were also observed in other serum proteins. These proteins, however, occurred only at low concentration in the sera and therefore appeared on the electrophoretograms as bands which were too weak or too diffuse for proper classification. Considerable variations were found in frequencies of the transferrin components in samples from different areas. The variations in samples seemed less evident for the albumin components. The geographical variations will be more completely dealt with in a later report