Protein sequencing: thermal conversion of thiazolinone derivatives of amino acids to thiohydantoins.

A tlc method is presented for the separation on PEI-cellulose of adenine derivatives from the acid-soluble fraction of brain tissue. The procedure permits the quantitative estimation of radioactivity distributed among adenine nucleotides and the determination of ATP specific activity following labeling with [¹⁴C] adenosine. Two rapid one-dimensional separations produce excellent resolution of AMP, ADP, ATP, adenine, and adenosine from each other and from the corresponding guanosine derivatives. A two-dimensional procedure gives excellent separation of ATP from all other deoxy- and ribonucleotides. The recovery of the separated components by elution is better than 94% and requires few technical manipulations. The technique possesses the advantages of simplicity and sensitivity and is applicable to small amounts of biological material.