A simple method for the approximation of the behaviour of marker constituents in density-fractionated red blood cells by means of normalized cumulative distribution functions.

: The present paper proposes a mathematical approach for the approximation of the relation between the concentration (or activity) of a cell constituent and the cumulative red cell distribution after density gradient centrifugation by means of normalized cumulative distribution functions (NCDF). With only one parameter (easily obtained on a programmable pocket calculator) and the mean concentration of the substance in the total red cell population this functional relation can be described in good approximation. The goodness of fit expressed by v2 (= square of correlation coefficient) to the experimentally obtained data is demonstrated for the cell constituents creatine (v2 = 0.85-0.97), RNA (v2 = 0.82-0.87) and G-6PD (v2 = 0.60-0.95). The method of NCDF is shown to be superior to an exponential function. It permits the estimation of a concentration (or activity) of a cell constituent for any chosen density-fractionated cell portion and thus gives information on the ratio of standardized portions of young: old cells.