IGF read?!?! kinda interesting

[sin]

I had to join that board and post over there....it was just too painful to read that and not respond. That kid is throwing out a bunch of unfounded claims and nothing more. As far as albumin being dangerous, it isn't. It's the most prevalent protein in your bloodstream at any moment. The addition of albumin or some other protein would be to just "block" and binding of IGF to the glass, which in and of itself is very unlikely due to its structure. It wouldn't "bind" to IGF, it may weakly associate with some regions, but this will have little or no effect on its potency.

you are talking about YOUR albumin, recognition of self/non-self is a big deal. there are a number of autoimmune diseases that are related or thought to be related to this. and not to sound like a dick, but you think you can see how these two proteins (IGF and albumin) are going to interact? how can you tell without looking at tertiary and quaternary structure, even then it would take a computer program to even have an idea.

[einstein1905]

you are talking about YOUR albumin, recognition of self/non-self is a big deal. there are a number of autoimmune diseases that are related or thought to be related to this. and not to sound like a dick, but you think you can see how these two proteins (IGF and albumin) are going to interact? how can you tell without looking at tertiary and quaternary structure, even then it would take a computer program to even have an idea.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Structure/CN3D/cn3d.shtml
The above program, as well as many other, will predict tertiary structure or show the actual tertiary structure submitted to medline. That's unneccesary though with IGF-1 and albumin. Albumin has no significant reactivity motifs. That's why it's commonly used in numerous protein assays to block nonspecific binding to reduce background.
Regarding autoimmune disease and albumin, you're off base. My albumin and your albumin are identical. Bovine serum albumin is almost identical to human. BSA in humans will even rarely cause be recognized (i.e. no anti-BSA antibodies will be propogated). Although a lot of autoimmunity does stem from an immunogen elliciting an cell-mediated response, which subsequently cross-reacts with a "self" component, thay are all pretty well characterized.
Not to sound like a pompous ass, but I'm an MD/PhD student....biomedical research is what I do. I'm in the lab the better part of each day or doing literature searches in the library. That's why when someone spouts off some "scientific" data, I question it. If it isn't in a peer-reviewd scientific journal, it's nothing more than someone's opinion.