It has been reported that hybridization of the equimolar mixtureof cyanomethemoglobin anddeoxyhemoglobin through dimer exchange reaction results inestablishment of an approximately
binomial(1:2:1) equilibrium
distribution of these parental hemoglobins andtheir hybrid molecule,(
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![](/images/gifchars/<font color=)
beta2.gif" BORDER=0 ALIGN="middle">), within several days under anaerobic conditions at pH 7.4, 21.5
![](/images/entities/deg.gif)
C, leading to a hyper (
i.e., about170 times) thermodynamic stability of(
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![](/images/gifchars/alpha.gif)
![](/images/gifchars/<font color=)
beta2.gif" BORDER=0 ALIGN="middle">)relative to the stability of the other diligandedspecies at pH 7.4, 21.5
![](/images/entities/deg.gif)
C [Daugherty, M. A., Shea, M. A., Johnson,J. A., LiCata, V. J., Turner, G. J.,& Ackers, G. K. (1991)
Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci.U.S.A. 88, 1110-1114]. To examinewhether the published"
binomiality" for this deoxy-cyanomet hybrid system reallyreflects the thermodynamic stability of(
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![](/images/gifchars/<font color=)
beta2.gif" BORDER=0 ALIGN="middle">), we used a
binomial (1:2:1) equilibrium
distribution of the equimolar mixture ofcyanomethemoglobin and fully oxygenated hemoglobin as a starting condition, andthen this system was rapidlydeoxygenated. We found that the relative population of the hybridwas reduced to 8.6% of the total upondeoxygenation. It was also found that the hybridization experimentunder anaerobic conditions was notallowed to continue for a long time due to a valency exchange reactionbetween deoxy and cyanometderivatives. For instance, a 48 h incubation resulted in theoxidation of 44% of Fe
2+ to Fe
3+ hemesinthe original deoxyhemoglobin and the reduction of 42% ofFe
3+ to Fe
2+ hemes in theoriginalcyanomethemoglobin. These results suggest that a real
distributionof the deoxy-cyanomet hybrid systemat equilibrium is fairly far from 1:2:1 (
binomial distribution), andthe thermodynamic stability of(
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![](/images/gifchars/<font color=)
beta2.gif" BORDER=0 ALIGN="middle">)is less than one-tenth of the hyperstability previously reported.In addition, most ofthe previous results on deoxy-cyanomet valency hybrids placed underlong anaerobic conditions shouldbe subject to reexamination due to possible valency exchangereactions.