The virtual absence of antigenic cross-reactivity between functionally distinct trout hemoglobins.

The antigenic properties of the hemoglobins of two species of rainbow trout, Salmo irideus and Salmo gairdneri, have been compared. Each of these species possess two different classes of hemoglobins, the members of the first of which have no Bohr effect while those of the second exhibit a pronounced pH dependence of their ligand affinities. The hemoglobins from these two species are antigenically indistinguishable. However, between the two classes of hemoglobins there is almost no immunological cross-reactivity.