Surfactant proteins SP-B and SP-C and their precursors in bronchoalveolar lavages from children with acute and chronic inflammatory airway disease

Table 2 Frequency of detection of SP-B, SP-C and their proforms in bronchalveolar lavages at the indicated molecular weights determined by Western blotting

	SP-B			Pro-SP-B		SP-C		Pro-SP-C
Western blot bands at (kDa)	8	16–18	30	19–21	24–25	4.2	7	3–4	15–16
CF (n = 21)	14 (67)	21 (100)	16 (76)	4 (19)	21 (100)	19 (90)	5 (26)	2 (10)	0 (0)
Chronic bronchitis (n = 15)	9 (60)	15 (100)	9 (60)	2 (13)	14 (93)	15 (100)	4 (26)	0 (0)	0 (0)
Pneumonia (n = 14)	4 (29)	14 (100)	6 (43)	1 (7)	12 (86)	13 (100)	2 (14)	0 (0)	0 (0)
Healthy controls (n = 14 for SP-B (not shown) and pro-SP-B reduced, n = 4 for SP-B non-reduced)	1 (25)	4 (100)	2 (50)	2 (14)	13 (93)	14 (100)	3 (21)	0 (0)	0 (0)

Absolute rate of detection, in brackets %. Western blots for SP-B and SP-C under non-reducing conditions, for pro-SP-Band pro-SP-C under reducing condition. Frequencies were compared by Fisher's exact test and corrected for the comparisons made within each group of molecular weights. No significant differences were detected.

ISSN: 1471-2466