Porphobilinogen

Abstract

Porphobilinogen was isolated by Westall (1952) from the urine of a patient with acute porphyria. A structure (I), to be discussed later, was assigned to it by Cookson & Rimington (1953) and Cookson (1953a) on the basis of the chemical reactions briefly recorded in these preliminary notes, and was further supported by the X-ray crystallographic investigations of Kennard (1953). In the present paper our chemical studies are described in detail, together with an improved method of isolation of porphobilinogen, and a discussion of its conversion into porphyrin.