Purification and characteristics of sturgeon chondroitin sulfate

Chondroitin sulfate(CS) has many functions and is widely used in food,medical and cosmetic industries.Elasmobranch is the main material source of fish chondroitin sulfate.Nowadays the main fish chondroitin sulfate product is from shark cartilage.However,it can not be mass-produced for the limited resources of shark.Sturgeon has resource advantage because it can be fostered by manpower.But the characteristics of sturgeon chondroitin sulfate have not been studied so far.In the present paper,sturgeon chondroitin sulfate was purified by the methods of ethanol classification precipitation and column chromatography.The purified sturgeon CS(chromatographically pure) and shark CS(chromatographically pure) of Sigma company were comparatively studied in molecular weight,rotation,sulfate group content,UV and visible spectra.The results show that the weight average,number average and Z average molecular weights of sturgeon CS are remarkably different from those of shark CS(P0.05).Molecular weight distribution indicates that the purity of extracted sturgeon CS is much higher than the shark CS(P0.05).It also shows that the sulfate group content of sturgeon CS is less than that of shark CS(P0.01).The power rotations of the two CSs are proved to be very different,too(P0.01).The strongest absorbance wavelength was 220 nm in UV and visible spectrum of sturgeon CS,while 230 nm in shark CS.These characteristics of sturgeon CS suggest its probable speciality in bioactivity and medical function.Presumably,sturgeon CS may have better anti-oxidation and anti-coagulant activities.