| As a contribution to the immunology of bacterial capsular polysaccharides, the structures of the K antigens from Klebsiella K79 and K35, and E. coli K44 were determined and are presented in this thesis. The techniques of sugar analysis, methylation, chromic acid oxidation, deamination, base-catalyzed uronic acid degradation, Smith degradation and partial hydrolysis were used in the structural elucidation of these polysaccharides. Methods such as gas-liquid chromatography, gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, gel permeation, ion-exchange and paper-chromatography were used to isolate and characterize oligosaccharides obtained from degradative procedures. N.m.r. spectroscopy (1H and (13C) was widely used in the characterization of the polysaccharides and of derived poly- and oligo-saccharides. In a few instances, n.m.r. spectroscopy and mass spectrometry were used to delineate the sequence of the sugars in the structure of the poly- and oligo-saccharides. The sum of these experiments establishes the following structures.*;*Please refer to dissertation for diagrams.;The bacteriophage-induced depolymerizations of the capsular polysaccharides of Klebsiella K79 and E. coli K44 are also reported in this thesis. The oligosaccharides isolated were characterized using the techniques described. The sum of these experiments demonstrated that the endoglycanase associated with Klebsiella (phi)79 had (beta)-galactosidase activity. The endoglycanase from E. coli (phi)44 exhibited (beta)-N-acetyl-galactosaminidase activity which is novel, in that it is the first reported action of this nature in the bacteriophages isolated for the species E. coli. |
