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Lipoperoxidation is implicated in various pathological conditions. Malonaldehyde (MDA) is the most commonly used marker of this process. We propose simple modifications to Yagi's fluorometric assay for MDA determinations, to avoid long and tedious manipulations by eliminating the first precipitation and washing steps, analogous to HPLC methods, and to increase both the sensitivity and the specificity of the assay by measuring synchronous fluorescence. The proposed technique is easier, faster, and more sensitive than Yagi's method (Academic Press, 1982: Lipid peroxides in biology and medicine). The results obtained with the novel method correlate with those from the HPLC method described by Therasse and Lemonnier (J Chromatogr Biomed Appl 1987;413:237-41).

We describe here an easy method of determining prolidase (EC 3.4.13.9) in plasma after preincubation with Mn2+ for 24 h at 37 degrees C to maximize prolidase activity. The mean activity in 338 patients who were either in hospital or outpatients was 900 U/L +/- 520 (2 SD), unrelated to sex or age. In 25 of these 338 samples tested, prolidase activity was between 1500 and 2000 U/L. It exceeded 2000 U/L in eight, all of whom were patients with chronic liver disease. Plasma prolidase activity was normal in cytolytic syndromes such as liver or heart disease. Of the 27 patients with cirrhosis, only five exhibited prolidase activity greater than 2000 U/L. Plasma prolidase activity was uncorrelated with six biochemical indexes to liver function (the aminotransferases, alkaline phosphatase, glutamyltransferase, total bilirubin, and serum albumin) or with the degree of cirrhotic fibrosis. We believe that plasma prolidase activity may be high only in the early stage of fibrosis. This hypothesis would be consistent with the data on rat-liver collagenolytic activities during CCl4 administration. Monitoring of plasma prolidase activity might be useful in evaluating fibrotic processes in chronic liver disease in the human.

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