Separation of monoclonal antibodies from antihapten antisera by two-dimensional affinity electrophoresis.

A high-resolution two-dimensional affinity electrophoresis (2D-AEP) method was developed, using capillary polyacrylamide gel (PAG) isoelectric focusing in the first and slab PAG affinity electrophoresis in the second direction. Using this method, anti-hapten antibodies were separated into a number of monoclonal antibody immunoglobulin G (IgG)] families, each of which is composed of several IgG spots having an identical affinity to the hapten but different isoelectric points. 2D-AEP may offer a powerful tool for solving fundamental problems in immunochemistry such as antibody heterogeneity, its hapten binding specificity and antigen-dependent somatic mutation.