Clemons A A, Geffen J F, Otto J M, Pratt K L, Harker C T
General Clinical Research Center, Oregon Health Sciences University, Portland 97201-3098, USA.
J Pineal Res. 1996 Jan;20(1):21-3. doi: 10.1111/j.1600-079x.1996.tb00234.x.
Melatonin research has primarily utilized blood as the source of samples, but there is now increasing interest in measuring levels of the hormone found in saliva. One impediment to this approach is that several melatonin assays involve a column-extraction step that can prove very time-consuming or even impossible when salivary samples are excessively viscous. We have treated 67 samples with dithiothreitol to enhance their passage through the column. Following this treatment, all samples passed freely through the columns. The minimum and maximum values measured were 0.7 - 50.0 pg/ml for the untreated controls and 1.0 - 51.9 pg/ml for the treated samples. The means (+/-SEM) for these groups were 9.5 +/- 1.6 and 9.9 +/- 1.7, respectively, and were not significantly different from one another as assessed by Student's t-test (P = 0.08). In summary, we have found that this technique permits us to obtain values on samples which would otherwise be unusable and that such treatment does not alter the melatonin values yielded by RIA analysis.
褪黑素研究主要采用血液作为样本来源，但目前人们对测量唾液中该激素水平的兴趣与日俱增。这种方法的一个障碍是，一些褪黑素检测方法涉及柱提取步骤，当唾液样本过于黏稠时，这一步骤可能非常耗时，甚至无法进行。我们用二硫苏糖醇处理了67个样本，以提高它们通过柱子的能力。经过这种处理后，所有样本都能自由通过柱子。未处理对照组测得的最小值和最大值分别为0.7 - 50.0 pg/ml，处理后样本的最小值和最大值分别为1.0 - 51.9 pg/ml。这些组的平均值（±SEM）分别为9.5±1.6和9.9±1.7，经学生t检验评估，二者之间无显著差异（P = 0.08）。总之，我们发现这种技术使我们能够获得原本无法使用的样本的值，并且这种处理不会改变放射免疫分析产生的褪黑素值。
