Radioimmunochemical characterization of hemoglobins Lepore and Kenya: unique antigenic determinants located on hybrid hemoglobins.

Antisera were produced in rabbits to the three known types of Lepore hemoglobins, which contain hybrid delta-beta non-alpha-chains, and to hemoglobin Kenya, which has a hybrid gamma-beta non-alpha-chain. By using a sensitive radioimmunoassay technique, the absorbed antisera were shown to contain an antibody population that was specific for the hybrid hemoglobin and did not cross-react with normal hemoglobins. However, with the absorbed Lepore-specific antisera, the three known types of Lepore hemoglobins were antigenically indistinguishable from each other, suggesting that antibodies are not produced to the primary structural differences which define the three non-alpha-chains of the Lepore hemoglobins. These studies demonstrate that the non-alpha-subunits of hemoglobins Lepore and Kenya possess unique antigenic determinant sites, evidently resulting from an altered polypeptide conformation.