Distribution of ligandin in normal and azocarcinogen-treated rat liver and azocarcinogen-induced liver tumors.

Antibodies were raised in rabbits against pure ligandin. Employing the fluorescent antibody procedure, an antigen identical to ligandin was shown to be uniformly distributed in the hepatic cells of both normal rat liver and in early and late 3'-methyl-4-dimethylaminoazobenzene (3'-Me-DAB)-treated liver. Ligandin was absent in liver carcinomas induced by this azocarcinogen. The results obtained with fluorescent antibody procedure were confirmed by the immunoquantitation of ligandin in the cytosols prepared from normal rat liver, early and late 3'-Me-DAB-treated liver, mixtures of both late 3'-Me-DAB-treated liver and liver carcinomas and liver carcinomas. Riboflavin-deficient diets lowered significantly the hepatic ligandin content.