Genetic polymorphism of basic proteins from parotid saliva.

In a study of 90 randomly chosen parotid salivas from Blacks three phenotypes were observed during acid-urea starch-gel electrophoresis. Inheritance was controlled by two codominant alleles at an autosomal locus. Of 101 Caucasians, one had a heterozygous phenotype indistinguishable electrophoretically from that in Blacks. Gene frequencies were: for Blacks, parotid basic protein (Pb(l)) = 0.84, (Pb(2)) = 0.16; for Caucasians, (Pb(l)) ~ 0.995, (Pb(2)) ~ 0.005.