Estimation of Pepsin in Gastric Juice

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BACKGROUND

Gastric juice secreted is used for digestion of foods. Pepsin is an important enzyme of gastric juice.¹ Therefore, the basic objective if these experiments is to estimate pepsin in gastric juice.

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REQUIREMENTS

Sample:         Gastric juice

Reagents:      Pepsin solution stock: Mix 50 mg pepsin in 100 ml of N/10 HCl

Edestine solution stock: Edestine 0.5 g is mixed with 150 ml of N/10 HCl and 350 ml of distilled water.

   Saturated N/10 HCl

   Saturated NaCl

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PROCEDURE

At first take 1 ml of stock edestine solution and to it add 1.8 ml of N/10 HCl and 0.2 ml of stock pepsin solution.² Then this mixture is incubated at 37^oC. Within intervals of 2 minutes these mixtures is taken out and is test with NaCl saturated solution. When opalescence does not occur then it means digestion is completed. The time taken for complete digestion should be noted. Now in the next step in place of pepsin stock solution take 0.2 ml gastric juice and repeat the experiment. Incubate it at 37^oC for the time as required for complete digestion of pepsin solution.³ Now bring out the mixture from incubator and compare it to the standard opalescence tubes. The amount of edestine digested gives the information about amount of pepsin present in the gastric juice and it is expressed in mg%.⁴

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CONCLUSION

Pepsin changes edestine into edeston. When saturated solution of N/10 Hcl is mixed with edestine it produces opalescence and no reaction with edestone. So, this helps in estimating the amount of pepsin in gastric juice.

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REFERENCES

1. Ashford, C. A., Heller, H., and Smart, G. A. (1949). The action of histamine on hydrochloric acid and pepsin secretion in man. Brit. J. Pharmacol., 4, 153-156.
   
2. Anson, M. L., and Mirsky, A. E. (1932). The estimation of pepsin with haemoglobin. J. gen. Physiol., 16, 59-63.
   
3. Browne, J. S. L., and Vineberg, A. M. (1932). The interdependence of gastric secretion and the CO0 content of the blood. J. Physiol., 75, 345-365.
4. Bucher, G. R., Grosman, M. I., and Ivy, A. C. (1945). A pepsin method-The role of dilution in the determination of peptic activity. Gastroenterology, 5, 501-511.