Immobilised peptide displaying phages as affinity ligands. Purification of lactoferrin from defatted milk

An affinity purification procedure for the direct purification of lactoferrin from defatted (skimmed) milk has been developed. The procedure is based on using selected phage clones expressing a peptide with high binding affinity for lactoferrin which were covalently coupled to macroporous poly(dimethylacrylamide) monolithic column. Large pore size (10-100 microm) of macroporous poly(dimethylacrylamide) makes it possible to couple long (1 microm) phage particles as ligands without any risk of blocking the monolithic column. Bound lactoferrin was eluted using 1M NaCl with a purity of >95%. The technique presents a good alternative to conventional immunoaffinity chromatography for purification of a protein of interest from complex samples due to (i) the robustness of the system in terms of recovery and ligand leakage and (ii) economical aspect in terms of low ligand cost.     

Enzyme‐Catalyzed Crosslinking in a Partly Frozen State: A New Way to Produce Supermacroporous Protein Structures

In this study a new way to produce supermacroporous protein structures was investigated. Enzyme‐mediated crosslinking of gelatin or casein was performed in a partly frozen state, which yielded stable, protein‐based cryogels. The reaction kinetics for the formation of cryogels were found to be fairly slow, most likely due to the low temperature (?12 °C) used or due to an increased viscosity owing to the cryo‐concentration taking place. The produced cryogels were characterized with regards to their physical properties and in vitro degradation. Furthermore, cryogels produced from gelatin and casein were evaluated as potential scaffolds by fibroblast cultivation to confirm their in vitro biocompatibility. Gelatin‐ and casein‐based scaffolds both supported cell proliferation and migration through the scaffold.

     

Evaluation of boronate-containing polymer brushes and gels as substrates for carbohydrate-mediated adhesion and cultivation of animal cells

Boronate-containing thin polyacrylamide gels (B-Gel), polymer brushes (B-Brush) and chemisorbed organosilane layers (B-COSL) were prepared on the surface of glass slides and studied as substrates for carbohydrate-mediated cell adhesion. B-COSL- and B-Brush-modified glass samples exhibited multiple submicron structures densely and irregularly distributed on the glass surface, as found by scanning electron microscopy and atomic force microscopy. B-Gel was ca. 0.1 mm thick and contained pores with effective size of 1–2 μm in the middle and of 5–20 μm on the edges of the gel sample as found by confocal laser scanning microscopy. Evidence for the presence of phenylboronic acid in the samples was given by time-of-flight secondary ion mass-spectrometry (ToF SIMS), contact angle measurements performed in the presence of fructose, and staining with Alizarin Red S dye capable of formation specific, fluorescent complexes with boronic acids. A comparative study of adhesion and cultivation of animal cells on the above substrates was carried out using murine hybridoma M2139 cell line as a model. M2139 cells adhered to the substrates in the culture medium without glucose or sodium pyruvate at pH 8.0, and then were cultivated in the same medium at pH 7.2 for 4 days. It was found that the substrates of B-Brush type were superior both regarding cell adhesion and viability of the adhered cells, among the substrates studied. MTT assay confirmed proliferation of M2139 cells on B-Brush substrates. Some cell adhesion was also registered in the macropores of B-Gel substrate. The effects of surface microstructure of the boronate-containing polymers on cell adhesion are discussed. Transparent glass substrates grafted with boronate-containing copolymers offer good prospects for cell adhesion studies and development of cell-based assays.     

Direct chromatographic capture of enzyme from crude homogenate using immobilized metal affinity chromatography on a continuous supermacroporous adsorbent

A continuous supermacroporous matrix has been developed allowing direct capture of enzyme from non-clarified crude cell homogenate at high flow-rates. The continuous supermacroporous matrix has been produced by radical co-polymerization of acrylamide, allyl glycidyl ether and N,N'-methylene-bis(acrylamide) which proceeds in aqueous solution of monomers frozen inside a column (cryo-polymerization). After thawing, the column contains a continuous matrix having interconnected pores of 10-100 microm size. Iminodiacetic acid covalently coupled to the cryogel is a rendering possibility for immobilized metal affinity chromatographic purification of recombinant His-tagged lactate dehydrogenase, (His)6-LDH, originating from thermophilic bacterium Bacillus stearothermophilus, but expressed in Escherichia coli. The large pore size of the adsorbent makes it possible to process particulate-containing material without blocking the column. No preliminary filtration or centrifugation is needed before application of crude extract on the supermacroporous column. A total of 210 ml crude homogenate, 75 ml of it non-clarified, was processed on a single 5.0 ml supermacroporous column at flow speeds up to 12.5 ml/min without noticeable impairment of the column properties. Mechanically the cryogel adsorbent is very stable. The continuous matrix could easily be removed from the column, dried at 70 degrees C and kept in a dry state. After rehydration and reinsertion of the matrix into an empty column, (His)6-LDH was purified as efficiently as on the newly prepared column. The procedure of manufacturing the supermacroporous continuous cryogel is technically simple. Starting materials and initiators are cheap and available and are simply mixed and frozen under specified conditions. Altogether these qualities reveal that the supermacroporous continuous cryogels is a very interesting alternative to existing methods of protein purification from particulate-containing crude extracts.     

Almost contact Kähler manifolds of constant holomorphic sectional curvature

We introduce the notion of an almost contact Kähler structure. We also define the holomorphic sectional curvature of the distribution of an almost contact Kähler structure with respect to an interior metric connection and establish relations between the φ-sectional curvature of an almost contact Kähler manifold and the holomorphic sectional curvature of the distribution of an almost contact Kähler structure.     

About the classification of the holonomy algebras of lorentzian manifolds

The classification of the holonomy algebras of Lorentzian manifolds can be reduced to the classification of the irreducible subalgebras h ? so(n) that are spanned by the images of linear maps from ? ⁿ to h satisfying some identity similar to the Bianchi identity. Leistner found all these subalgebras and it turned out that the obtained list coincides with the list of irreducible holonomy algebras of Riemannian manifolds. The natural problem is to give a simple direct proof of this fact. We give such a proof for the case of semisimple not simple Lie algebras h.     

Characterization of polyacrylamide based monolithic columns

Supermacroporous monolithic polyacrylamide (pAAm)-based columns have been prepared by radical cryo-copolymerization (copolymerization in the moderately frozen system) of acrylamide with functional co-monomer, allyl glycidyl ether (AGE), and cross-linker N,N'-methylene-bis-acrylamide (MBAAm) directly in glass columns (ID 10 mm). The monolithic columns have uniform supermacroporous sponge-like structure with interconnected supermacropores of pore size 5-100 microm. The monoliths can be dried and stored in the dry state. High mechanical stability of the monoliths allowed sterilization by autoclaving. Column-to-column reproducibility of pAAm-monoliths was demonstrated on 5 monolithic columns from different batches prepared under the same cryostructuration conditions.     

Phase Separations in Water–Salt Solutions of Polyelectrolyte Complexes Formed by RNA and Polycations: Comparison with DNA Complexes

Formation of insoluble polyelectrolyte complexes (PECs) between RNA and polycations was followed by measuring the residual RNA absorbance in the solution after separation of the precipitate. The polycations studied were poly(N,N′‐dimethyldiallylammonium) chloride (pendant type) and 2,5‐ionene bromide (integral type) with quaternary amino groups in every monomer unit. The data obtained were compared with the results of analogous studies of DNA‐containing PECs. This study is a part of a project aimed at the specific separation of plasmid DNA from RNA, a major problem in the preparative isolation of plasmid DNA. We thus deliberately chose a heterogenous RNA sample as it represents the RNA present in a real cell extract. In contrast to the exhaustive precipitation of DNA observed at certain φ values, a significant part of RNA was nonprecipitated at any φ = [+]/[?], that is, at any ratio of positively charged quaternary amino groups and negatively charged phosphate groups. The addition of sodium chloride increased the nonprecipitated fraction of RNA. DNA, on the other hand, was completely precipitated by both polycations at φ > 0.7. The less effective precipitation of RNA was probably due to the presence of a considerable fraction of short‐chained molecules, incapable of forming a sufficient cooperative system of salt bonds with the polycation. This assumption was supported by a separate experiment, in which the precipitation behavior of RNA fractions of different molecular masses was investigated. The same tendency, while less pronounced, was also ascertained for PECs formed by polycations with DNA fractions of different molecular masses. The possibility of using the revealed differences between DNA and RNA behavior for effective precipitation procedure useful in bioseparation is discussed. The difference in the precipitation behavior of nucleic acids of different molecular masses means there is a possibility for developing an enzymatic assay for DNAase and RNAase activity.

The relative residual absorbance of RNA (closed symbols) and DNA (open symbols) remaining in solution after precipitation with 2,5‐ionene bromide as a function of the charge ratio, [+]/[?], determined at different concentrations of sodium chloride (M ).