Abstract
Purpose:
Alpha-crystalline including α A- and α B-crystalline, are the major lens structure proteins. These proteins were proved to play a very important role on maintaining the lens transparence. The purpose of our research is to investigate the αA- and αB-crystalline variant expression in age related, congenital cataract and normal people.
Methods:
Real-time PCR and Western blot were performed with anterior capsular samples of human lens. The αA- and αB-crystalline mRNA and protein expression in normal people, age related and congenital cataract patients groups had been investigated.
Results:
The αA- and αB-crystalline were slightly reduced in age related cataract group. Being compared with that in normal people group, the Alpha-crystalline on mRNA and protein level decreasing significantly in congenital cataract group.
Conclusions:
Our experiments indicated that the reduction of alpha-crystalline in age-related and congenital cataract groups has significant difference.
Keywords: 533 gene/expression •
445 cataract •
659 protein structure/function