Comparison of the blood clearance of triple- and single-helical schizophyllan in mice.

(1-->3)-beta-D-Glucans exhibit a variety of biological and immunopharmacological activities, and the degree of these activities depends on the nature of the individual glucans e.q. molecular weight, degree of branching and conformation. Based on the generally accepted evidence that the conformation of Sonifilan (SPG) used clinically is a triple helix, we prepared alkali-denatured SPG (SPG-OH) as a single helix conformer. In this report, we measured the concentration of beta-glucan administered to mice by using a beta-glucan-specific reagent prepared from limulus amebocyte lysate (Gluspecy [G test], Seikagaku Corporation, Tokyo) and discuss the blood clearance of SPG and SPG-OH following intraperitoneal (i.p.) or intravenous (i.v.) administration. Comparing the clearance of SPG-OH from the blood with that of SPG, SPG-OH was removed faster than SPG following both i.p. and i.v. administration. This strongly suggests that the clearance of beta-glucans is dependent on their conformation.