An enzymic method for determination of the average chain lengths of glycogens and amylopectins

A new method for the determination of the average chain lengths of glycogens and amylopectins is described. The method utilizes yeast glucosidase-transferase and sweet-potato β-amylase, and was tested successfully against a number of samples of polysaccharides of known chain lengths. The method has several advantages over previous enzymic methods in that (1) it is relatively insensitive to the presence of α-amylase, (2) the enzymes required are readily available—sweet-potato β-amylase is commercially available and we describe a relatively simple method for the isolation of the yeast glucosidase-transferase, (3) the time required for the assay is short, relative to the method of Lee and Whelan (8).