APPLYING PRINCIPAL COMPONENTS-ANALYSIS TO THE AMINO-ACID-COMPOSITION OF KERATIN MATERIALS

To characterize keratin materials and assess changes due to processing , amino acid analysis (AAA) is an important tool, yielding a complex d ata pattern. Principal components analysis is applied to AAA data take n from the literature for a wide variety of keratins from various sour ces as well as their main protein components. The analysis reveals tha t the principal components underlying the AAA spectrum mainly relate t o the keratin intermediate filaments and their associated proteins on the one hand and the high glycine-tyrosine proteins on the other. Prin cipal components analysis of amino acid analyses can thus be considere d a versatile tool with a high potential to detect and assess changes in keratins due to natural or artificial causes.