Additionally, both proteins havethe capacity to form oligomers in solutions. At neutral pH, which is characteristic of body fluids such as bloodand cerebrospinal fluid, HCC predominantly exists in the monomericform. On the other hand, HSA under theseconditions is thought to be monomeric, although ca. 5% of it mightbe covalently dimerized. In further studies,we decided to use only monomeric forms of both proteins; HSA was purifiedby size exclusion chromatography to remove dimers and trimers, andin the case of HCC, we used the monomeric V57G variant to avoid dimerformation. This evidence concerns the gene ALB and hepatocellular carcinoma.