Poly(hydroxyethyl methacrylate) membranes: as a hydrogel support for use in immobilized metal affinity chromatography

Lysozyme adsorption onto a dye ligand (Procion Red HE-3B) immobilized and Cu(II) incorporated poly(2-hydroxyethylmethacrylate) (pHEMA) membrane, were investigated. The membranes were prepared by UV initiated photopolymerization of HEMA in the presence of an initiator (α-α′-azoisobutyronitrile; AIBN). The amount of immobilized dye on the membrane was 112.2 μmol g^?1. Lysozyme adsorption on to these membranes from aqueous solutions containing different amounts of lysozyme at different pH was investigated in batch system. Lysozyme adsorption capacity of the dye-ligand immobilized membrane was 45.6 mg g^?1. Lysozyme adsorption capacity of the Cu(II) incorporated membranes (112.3 mg g^?1) was greater than that of the Procion Red HE-3B immobilized membranes. The non-specific adsorption of lysozyme on the pHEMA membranes was 0.14 mg g^?1. More than 97% of the adsorbed lysozyme were desorbed in 60 in the desorption medium containing 1.0 M KSCN at pH 8.0.