Amino acid sequence studies on plasmin-derived fragments of human fibrinogen: amino-terminal sequences of intermediate and terminal fragments.

The progressive changes in amino-terminal sequence brought about by the digestion of human fibrinogen by plasmin have been studied. In addition, the limit products (fragments D and E) have been isolated and characterized in the same way. These studies have confirmed the generally accepted scheme of fibrinogen being changed into a large molecular weight fragment X, which in turn is converted into an intermediate fragment Y and a limit fragment D, followed by the breakdown of fragment Y into an additional fragment D and another core fragment E. Our data allow the precise identification of several of the junctions being attacked, including one in a region of the gamma-chain whose sequence has not previously been reported. The cleavages are not singular in any case, however, and, as suggested by others, intermediate species exist which correspond to "early D," "late D," etc. In addition to localizing the exact bonds split by plasmin, we have been able to sequentially position the core fragments relative to each other, since the gamma-chain amino terminus of fragment D has been found to be contiguous to the known carboxy-terminal sequence of fragment E.