Isolation and characterization of advanced glycation end products derived from the in vitro reaction of ribose and collagen

Abstract

An amino acid component, NFC-1, when formed in vitro by the reaction of ribose and protein was shown to comprise a complex mixture of high and low molecular AGE compounds. Two low-molecular-weight components have been successfully isolated and their structure determined. These were αNFC-1 [NΔ-(4-oxo-5-dihydroimidazol-2-yl)-l-ornithine] and βNFC-1 a 4-imidazolon-2-yl derivative existing in three tautomeric forms. These imidazolone compounds have been shown to originate from the reaction of arginine with glyoxal and methylglyoxal, respectively. A third ninhydrin-positive AGE, γNFC-1, was shown to be composed of a number of chromatographically similar compounds which have not yet been characterized.