Alpha 1-antitrypsin phenotypes of healthy persons and chronic bronchitis patients

The paper is concerned with phenotyping of alpha 1-antitrypsin using a method of isoelectric focusing in the polyacrylamide gel with ampholine (pH-4-6) in 1000 healthy persons and 583 patients with chronic bronchitis. Phenotype M was registered in 96 and 95.71% of the cases, respectively. The occurrence of heterozygous phenotypes was practically similar among the healthy persons as well as among the patients (4.0 and 4.29%, respectively). It was concluded that the heterozygous carrying of an alpha 1-antitrypsin deficit gene was of no particular importance in the development of chronic bronchitis.