ABSTRACT
The need for the quantitation of different lipoprotein fractions, instead of total cholesterol and triglyceride determination, is evident according to recent epidemiological, clinical, and experimental studies on the significance of lipoproteins as risk factors for atherosclerotic diseases. According to their specific structure, the isolation of lipoproteins can be done with ultracentrifugation, selective precipitation, or electrophoretic procedures, and rarely with chromatography. The precipitation of lipoproteins depends upon polyanions and cations used, the concentrations of reagents, pH, ionic strength, and the presence of other serum proteins. Electrophoresis has been until widely used as a separation method for serum lipoproteins because of the relative simplicity and speed of the technique. The immunochemical methods for quantitation of apoproteins from serum or fractionated lipoprotein classes are based on specific antisera for each apoprotein to be determined, and the most commonly used techniques are radial immunodiffusion, electroimmunoassay, and radioimmunoassay.
