Cereal Chem 56:20 - 23.  |  VIEW ARTICLE
Distribution and Electrophoretic Properties of Alcohol-Soluble Proteins in Normal and High- Lysine Sorghums.

J. W. Paulis and J. S. Wall. Copyright 1979 by the American Association of Cereal Chemists, Inc. 

Electrophoretic patterns and amino acid compositions were compared between alcohol-soluble proteins from normal and high-lysine sorghum grain meals. Sequential extraction of grain meals by a modified Osborne-Mendel scheme confirmed findings that the high-lysine sorghums contained more salt-soluble and alcohol-insoluble reduced glutelins and less alcohol-soluble proteins, kafirin, and alcohol-soluble reduced glutelin (ASRG) than did the normal sorghums. Kafirin and ASRG had similar amino acid compositions in each variety and differed only slightly between varieties. Kafirin and ASRG polypeptides migrated primarily as a prominent broad band with an apparent molecular weight of 22,000 during sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis, but they were heterogeneous by polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis in 8M urea-aluminum lactate pH 3.1. Electrophoretic patterns of kafirins and ASRGs for near-isogenic normal and high-lysine genotypes were similar, but different, between unrelated varieties. These data suggest a close relationship between kafirins and ASRG proteins. Polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis is useful for characterizing, comparing, and differentiating sorghum alcohol-soluble proteins in genetic investigations.