Similarity in the bound carbohydrate groups of glycoproteins from cells of several vertebrate classes.

The carbohydrate groups of the glycoproteins of human, hamster, chick, reptile and fish cells growing in culture have been fractionated in succession according to size (Sephadex G-50), affinity for concanavalin A, charge (DEAE-Sephadex) and by thin-layer chromatography. It was found that despite the complexity of the array of separable glycopeptides in each type of cell, most of these structures seemed to be common to all of the cells. This suggests that they have existed in a relatively stable state for several hundreds of millions of years throughout the evolution of the vertebrates.