An N-Acetylgalactosaminyltransferase from Human Blood Group A Plasma

Abstract

Abstract An N-acetylgalactosaminyltransferase which is present in the plasma only of individuals of blood groups A and AB was found to adsorb to agarose gel beads. The binding could be reversed by addition of uridine nucleotides. These properties appear to be unique characteristics of this enzyme among glycosyltransferases and other proteins in human plasma. The enzyme probably binds to an inhibitor of the glycosyltransferase reaction which is present in the agarose. The specific binding exhibited by this transferase allowed an essentially one-step purification of the enzyme to be achieved by a simple adsorption to agarose and elution with UDP.