Analysis of platelet phospholipids by high performance liquid chromatography. II--Studies on hitherto unknown peak of phospholipid of human platelets

Lysosomal concept of platelet secretion--revisited

Certain morphological and biochemical aspects of platelet secretion are discussed. Based on own experiments and review of the literature a hypothesis is forwarded that platelet secretory granules or rather storage organelles can be viewed as secondary lysosomes participating in platelet endocytosis and exocytosis. Formation of the platelet thromboplastic activity, so called PF3, is linked to the platelet storage organelles disintegration and lypolysis during their exocytosis through the platelet plasma membrane.

Disease and anatomic specificity of ethanolamine plasmalogen deficiency in Alzheimer's disease brain

A significant and selective deficiency of ethanolamine plasmalogen (PPE) relative to phosphatidylethanolamine was identified in post mortem brain samples from patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD). This lipid defect showed anatomic specificity, being more marked at a site of neurodegeneration in AD brain than in a region relatively spared by the disease (mid-temporal cortex vs. cerebellum) and disease specificity for AD: it was not observed at the primary site of neurodegeneration in Huntington's disease (caudate nucleus) nor Parkinson's disease (substantia nigra). PPE deficiency parallels an inherent tendency towards membrane bilayer instability previously detected in AD brain which is necessarily due to a change in membrane lipid composition, and which may contribute to AD pathogenesis.

Separation of major polar lipids in Pecten maximus by high-performance liquid chromatography and subsequent determination of their fatty acids using gas chromatography

An easy method for the separation of major polar lipid classes by HPLC is described. Maximum resolution was achieved by an automated combination of a silica gel column and a diol column. Polar lipid analysis of the larvae and gonads of Pecten maximus showed the presence of a particular glycolipid especially rich in 22:6(n - 3) and the predominance of 20:4(n - 6) in the phosphatidylinositol. The phosphatidylcholine and phosphatidylethanolamine (diacyl form + alkenylacyl) were the major fractions. The plasmalogen form (25% in larvae, 34% in gonads) was essentially composed of polyunsaturated fatty acids of 20 and 22 carbons in the sn-2 position.

Acidic hydrolysis of plasmalogens followed by high-performance liquid chromatography

A simple, quantitative method for determining the plasmalogen content of small samples is reported here. The method uses the different susceptibility to acid-catalyzed hydrolysis of the alkyl, alkenyl and acyl linkages to separate the plasmalogen subclass from the other two non-labile subclasses. Hydrolysis of plasmenylethanolamine and plasmenylcholine was complete after 4 and 1 min of acid treatment, respectively. The acid-catalyzed hydrolysis did not alter the phospholipid fatty acid composition, making this method useful for fatty acid compositional analysis of the plasmalogen subclass. High-performance liquid chromatography was used for separations, and phospholipids were quantitated by assay of lipid phosphorus or by direct quantitation of peak area. Using this method, small amounts (10 nmol) of ethanolamine glycerophospholipid and choline glycerophospholipid are subjected to acid-catalyzed hydrolysis and subsequent separation of the resulting lysocompounds obtained from plasmalogens from the more acid-stable alkylacyl and diacyl glycerophospholipid fractions. Our values for plasmalogens from commercial preparations of choline and ethanolamine glycerophospholipids agree with literature values. The usefulness of the method is demonstrated for small glycerophospholipid samples that are equivalent to samples from cultured neural cells.

Malignant hyperthermia: an altered phospholipid and fatty acid composition in muscle membranes

There is thought to be a genetic defect within the calcium release channel of the sarcoplasmic reticulum in malignant hyperthermia (MH). This primary alteration is hypothesized to influence the function and/or structure of various muscle membrane systems; e.g., to have a direct effect on the composition of the lipid matrix. Therefore, in striated muscle samples, we determined the quantity and fatty acid composition of the various types of membrane phospholipids. German Landrace pigs were classified as normal or susceptible to MH. Total lipid content from longissimus dorsi, semi-membranosus muscle, and heart left ventricular (HLV) samples were extracted with chloroform/methanol and subsequently separated by high performance liquid chromatography. The single phospholipid fractions were collected and, following derivatization, the quantities of individual fatty acids were determined using a capillary gas chromatographic method. In general, samples from the susceptible pigs contained lower absolute amounts of individual phospholipids. The most notable differences occurred in the HLV, where phosphatidylinositol, phosphatidylserine, phosphatidylethanolamine and sphingomyelin were all significantly less (P less than or equal to 0.05). The muscle from the susceptible animals also contained decreased amounts of the polyunsaturated phospholipid-bound fatty acids (P less than or equal to 0.05). These differences in phospholipid and fatty acid concentrations of membranes isolated from swine susceptible to MH may relate to their apparently increased sensitivities to halothane (e.g., fluidizing effects) or elevated temperature.

Separation of major phospholipid classes by high-performance liquid chromatography and subsequent analysis of phospholipid-bound fatty acids using gas chromatography

A sensitive high-performance liquid chromatographic method for the separation of major phospholipid (PL) classes in biological materials is described. Using this method it was easy to separate P-cholin, P-ethanolamine, P-serine, P-inositol, cardiolipin, sphingomyelin, lyso-P-choline and lyso-P-ethanolamine from skeletal and cardiac muscle samples. The method is based on the simultaneous use of a pH gradient and a polarity gradient. This procedure can easily be modified to optimize the separation of PLs from very different tissues. Subsequent analysis of the PL-bound fatty acids (FAs) by gas chromatography resulted in a well separated FA pattern. Following this FA separation it was possible to recalculate the specific PL content in the original sample.