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Tara Tibbs Jones

Publications and source records attributed to Tara Tibbs Jones.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

Protein instability during HIC: describing the effects of mobile phase conditions on instability and chromatographic retention.

Hydrophobic interaction chromatography (HIC) is known to be potentially denaturing to proteins, but the effects of mobile phase conditions on chromatographic behavior are not well understood. In this study, we apply a model describing the effects of secondary protein unfolding equilibrium on chromatographic behavior, including the effects of salt concentration on both stability and adsorption. We use alpha-lactalbumin as a model protein that in the presence and absence of calcium, allows evaluation of adsorption parameters for folded and unfolded species independently. The HIC adsorption equilibrium under linear binding conditions and solution phase protein stability have been obtained from a combination of literature and new experiments. The effect of salt concentration on protein stability and the rate constant for unfolding on the chromatographic surface have been determined by fitting the model to isocratic chromatography data under marginally stable conditions. The model successfully describes the effects of added calcium and ammonium sulfate. The results demonstrate the importance of considering the effects on stability of mobile phase modifiers when applying HIC to marginally stable

Adsorption↗

Hydrophobic interaction chromatography selectivity changes among three stable proteins: conformation does not play a major role.

Interesting retention and selectivity changes have been noted for a number of proteins in hydrophobic interaction chromatography (HIC). In this study, we investigated the degree to which conformational changes may be responsible for selectivity changes of stable proteins. Hydrogen-deuterium isotope exchange detected by mass spectrometry was used to investigate changes in solvent accessibility during adsorption on HIC media. Lysozyme was determined to exhibit EX2 hydrogen exchange kinetics both in solution and adsorbed to Butyl Sepharose 4 Fast Flow and Phenyl Sepharose 6 Fast Flow high sub surfaces. A small, but significant, increase in solvent accessibility was observed upon adsorption. Similar approaches were used to analyze solvent accessibility of three stable proteins with melting temperatures above 50 degrees C exhibiting significant selectivity changes on Butyl Sepharose and Toyopearl Butyl 650M. While all three proteins (lysozyme, chymotrypsinogen A, and ovalbumin) exhibited enhanced exchange while adsorbed, no differences in solvent accessibility on the different adsorbents were observed. More detailed studies of lysozyme showed no significant changes in labeling prior or during elution. These results demonstrate that HIC surfaces examined here do not dramatically alter the structure of these stable proteins and that differences in conformation are not responsible for the selectivity changes observed. Thus, other factors such as different preferred binding orientations or variations between the media pore structure, size, and/or surface chemistry must be responsible.

Adsorption↗

Alpha-lactalbumin tertiary structure changes on hydrophobic interaction chromatography surfaces.

Hydrogen exchange (HX) detected by mass spectrometry (MS) was used to analyze the structure of calcium-free alpha-lactalbumin, a model protein with marginal stability. Two chromatographic peaks were observed from samples of pure protein eluted from SOURCE phenyl hydrophobic interaction chromatography (HIC) media. Whole-protein HX measurements showed that the less-retained peak had solvent exposure similar to native protein in the absence of the HIC surface while the retained protein was nearly, although not fully, solvent exposed. The formation of these two peaks was kinetically limited. The protein also refolded successfully following elution. In addition, proteolytic fragmentation was used to analyze HX at the peptide level. This approach revealed that helix C was the most stable region of alpha-lactalbumin under native conditions and in the flow-through peak. Helix C also formed the core of residual native structure in the partially unfolded protein in the retained peak. The results suggest that residues that are most solvent accessible under native conditions may be those most likely to unfold upon adsorption.

Amino Acid Sequence↗