Preparation and some properties of hyaluronic acid from umbilical cord of the pig.

Within the last 13 years hyaluronic acid has been isolated from a variety of sources (1): umbilical cord, vitreous humor, synovial fluid, tumors, and hemolytic streptococci. These mucopolysaccharides all have essentially the same chemical composition, equimolecular portions of acetylglucosamine and glucuronic acid, but vary greatly in viscosity. Hyaluronic acid was first isolated by Meyer and Palmer (2) in 1934 from bovine vitreous humor. Human umbilical cord was shown by them (3) to be a rich source of hyaluronic acid. Recently Hadidian and Pirie (4) have prepared from this same source a product more viscous than any hitherto obtained. However, the unbilical cord of no species other than the human has yet been investigated as a source of hyaluronic acid. It was the purpose of this work to investigate pig umbilical cord as a source and examine the properties of the hyaluronic acid derived.