Removal of the Sphingolipid impurity from preparations of yeast phosphatidyl inositol

Abstract

A complex sphingolipid containing inositol and mannose, present in lipid extracted from toluene-autolyzed baker's yeast, was eluted from silicic acid columns immediately after phosphatidyl inositol, and was the main nitrogenous impurity in crude preparations of this phospholipid. Nitrogen-free phosphatidyl inositol was obtained by rechromatography on alumina. Modifications to the chromatographic procedure also gave diphosphatidyl glycerol containing the theoretical 4.29% P.

Keywords

• yeast
• phosphatidyl inositol
• sphingolipid
• silicic acid chromatography
• alumina chromatography
• diphosphatidyl glycerol