Affinity chromatography used in distinguishing alpha-fetoprotein in serum from patients with tumors of hepatic parenchyma and of germ cells.

We used affinity chromatography on concanavalin A Sepharose to study the serum alpha-fetoprotein of 10 patients with histologically proven germ-cell tumors and 12 patients with primary liver cancer. Less than 50% of the fetoprotein from germ-cell tumors bound to concanavalin A, as compared with more than 80% of the alpha-fetoprotein from primary liver cancers.