- Relationship between crude protein content and keratin
- Any existing mathematical expression or equation relating these two?
- Hair keratin extraction
- Crude protein
Proteins account for about 91 percent of hair; between 65-95 percent of this could be keratin, depending on the hair type.
Actually, this depends upon the definition one uses of keratin. If keratin is made by a DNA sequence and this DNA sequence equals a protein sequence, this would be the definition of keratin. So technically, if only 91% of hair of keratin were keratin, what is the other 9% and where does it originate? Could be possible that 9% of keratin in this model would be an interface or interfacial chemical components that connect keratin to something else. In that case the definition part shows up again: is the interface part of keratin or part of what it is connected to?
@ Onaolapo and Schmidt, the result of my proximate analysis revealed the crude content of the investigated hair to be 40 %. I want to proceed to keratin extraction and I want to be sure if this is going to be worthwhile as I expected the crude protein content to be higher than the obtained value.
My unreasonable request is that you go through the attached article and calculate the N% in keratin. Use this number instead of using a generic N to protein ratio value to calculate % protein. Will still be an approximation, except a better answer.
The true limitation on keratin extraction is that one at best gets soluble keratin, and if one uses a base to solubilize keratin, the base does allow for hydrolysis of some peptide bonds. The decomposition products are amino acid sequences and/or amino acids, so it can look like a uniform chemical substance when in fact it will be a mixture. Most likely, the procedures one uses to increase keratin solubility will also make the resulting chemical substance correspondingly more non-uniform. Does not in anyway invalidate the experiment. One does however need to be aware of and include the chemistry that is occurring during the procedures used. The keratin structure in does not necessarily equal the keratin structure out.
@ Schmidt Thanks for the article, I kind of have a clear sense of what I am looking for now. (A relationship between amino-acid and crude protein content)
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11234918 (Article needed, Thanks)
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