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Concanavalin A and wheat germ agglutinin, lectins that interact with serum glycoprotein in a manner similar to the antigen--antibody reaction, were used as "antibodies" in a single radial immunodiffusion technique to test a coded serum panel (from the National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Md., and the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn.) containing a) 99 serum samples from patients with different types of malignant neoplasms of the gastrointestinal tract, prostate gland, and lung, b) 50 samples from patients with benign diseases of the same organs as those affected in the cancer patients, and c) 50 samples from apparently healthy smokers. The resulting precipitation rings were not correlated to serum protein concentration, and the differences (demonstrated by Student's t-test and with a generalization of the one-sided two-sample Kolmogorov-Smirnov statistic for evaluating diagnostic tests) established that serum glycoproteins are glycosylated differently in cancer patients than in people without cancer.

More protein is required to detect the Inv(1) antigen carried in the light chain of immunoglobulin G molecules when the light chain is combined with a gamma2 heavy chain than when it is combined with a gamma1 or gamma3 heavy chain. One of the four gamma2 heavy chains used in the experiment, however, was as efficient as the gamma1 and gamma3 chains, indicating that there may be two subtypes of gamma2. Inv(1) was more easily detected in one of the two light chains used in the experiment. This difference may be associated with the subtypes of the kappa chain derived from studies of the variable portion of the chain.

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