Kinetics of Advanced Glycation End Products Formation on Bovine Serum Albumin with Various Reducing Sugars and Dicarbonyl Compounds in Equimolar Ratios

Reducing sugars and reactive dicarbonyl compounds play a major role in glycation of proteins in vivo. Glycation of proteins is the first step in of a nonenzymatic reaction, resulting in advanced glycation end products (AGEs). AGEs can inactivate proteins or modify their biological activities. Therefore, it is important to understand the mechanism of AGE formation. Here, we systematically analyzed the kinetics of AGE formation in vitro by fluorescence and absorption measurements utilizing a microplate reader system and bovine serum albumin (BSA) as a model protein. Comparing different concentrations of BSA, we applied various reducing sugars and reactive dicarbonyl compounds as AGE-inducing agents at different concentrations. In summary, this experimental setup enabled us to measure the kinetics of AGE formation in an efficient and defined way

A clinical, cytogenetic and molecular study in Prader-Willi patients

Twenty-three patients with a putative diagnosis of Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS) were reassessed clinically and then examined by cytogenetic and molecular techniques. Nineteen patients fulfilled the diagnostic criteria for PWS and the remaining four were judged to have atypical PWS. Definite molecular defects were detected in all clinically typical PWS patients but one. A deletion of part of chromosome 15q could be identified molecularly in 14 patients (74%) and maternal disomy for chromosome 15 in four (21%). In all, except one, PWS patients with molecularly detected deletions, the deletion was also identified by cytogenetic studies. Cytogenetic deletions were suspected in two of the atypical PWS patients. However, based on the results of scoring the diagnostic criteria for PWS and on the PW71B methylation test, we were able to rule out PWS in all of our atypical patients. Our study confirms observations that both clinical and cytogenetic investigations can provide misdiagnoses of PWS in some patients, and the first, simple and fast investigation, which can confirm the PWS in most, if not all PWS patients, is molecular analysis by the methylation test