1979 Volume 99 Issue 10 Pages 971-975
Alkali fusion of melanin, extracted from Cochliobolus miyabeanus, human hair, and sunflower seeds, was carried out, its decomposition product was extracted with a solvent, and the product was identified by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. Melanin produced by C. miyabeanus was very similar to that from sunflower seeds, and there was no essential difference between the melanin from human hair and that from sunflower seeds. (the indole type and the catechol type melanin according to the classification by R.A. Nicolaus) Since the carboxylic acid derivative of pyrrole, thought to originate from the indole ring, was detected in the decomposition product of melanin from sunflower seeds, it was concluded that melanin is a heterogeneous polymer and cannot be divided clearly into the indole type or the catechol type, as proposed by Nicolaus and others, and that if a larger amount of indole compounds took part as a monomer at the time of polymerization in vivo, melanin with higher nitrogen content will be formed and, if a larger proportion of phenol compounds not containing nitrogen took part in this polymerization, melanin with lower nitrogen content would be formed.
