Bovine dental pulp collagens: characterization of types III and V collagen.

Pulp was essentially solubilized by partial pepsin digestion. The various genetic types of collagens were isolated by differential salt precipitation and extraction. Types I, III and V collagen represented 56, 41 and 2% of the total collagen, respectively. The type V collagen comprised two different molecular species consisting of [alpha 1(V)]2 alpha 2(V) and alpha 1(V) alpha 2(V) alpha 3(V), the ratio of which was approx. 1:1.3. The major portion of the type III collagen was present as a high molecular weight aggregate which released alpha 1(III) chains upon reduction with 2-mercaptoethanol.