Mechanical precipitation of hemoglobin köln.

Hb Köln (beta 98 Val leads to Met) was found to precipitate rapidly during mechanical shaking. The rate of precipitation of Hb Köln is 5-6 times faster than that of Hb S. The kinetics of precipitation of the patient's hemolysate, which is a mixture of Hb Köln and Hb A, showed a biphasic curve indicating that Hb Köln precipitates independently from Hb A. The instability of Hb Köln may be attributed to the conformational change in the vicinity of heme. The mechanical shaking may be used as a new method for detection and quantitation of hemoglobin Köln and other unstable hemoglobins.