Isolation and characterization of sets of anti-L-fucose and anti-bovine serum albumin antibodies directed against a glycoconjugate of L-fucose and bovine serum albumin.

A set of anti-carbohydrate antibodies and a set of anti-protein antibodies were isolated from the serum of rabbits immunized with a glycoconjugate of L-fucose and bovine serum albumin. The sets were separated by affinity chromatography by a two-column method on adsorbents with L-fucose or bovine serum albumin ligands. Isoelectrofocusing results showed that the anti-carbohydrate antibodies consisted of 11 molecular species and the anti-bovine serum albumin antibodies consisted of seven molecular species. The anti-carbohydrate antibodies are all of the IgG type while the anti-protein antibodies contain three types of globulin molecules, IgA, IgG, and IgM. The former antibodies should be useful as markers for unique glycoproteins of diseased cells and the latter antibodies may be useful for investigating the mechanism of simultaneous synthesis of three types of immunoglobulins.