Electrodialysis with ultrafiltration membranes for peptide separation

A number of bioactive peptides find their potential applications in food or pharmaceutical industry; however, there arise some limitations of their large-scale production to satisfy market demands. Although pressure-driven membrane processes are able of continuous production and separation of peptides, these technologies often demonstrate insufficient selectivity. Electrophoresis is a well-known purification process characterized by high resolution of separated species but it is limited by relatively low production capacity. On the other hand, electromembrane processes offer high production capacity but their limitation is the size of separated molecules. Electrodialysis with inserted ultrafiltration membranes is an alternative method of peptide separation into fractions, their concentration and possibly demineralization at the same time to achieve large production quantities. It is a hybrid process combining conventional electrodialysis and electrophoresis principles using ultrafiltration membranes. These membranes serve as a molecular barrier separating two types of solution while the driving force remains electric potential difference. This article offers state-of-the-art summary in the field of bioactive peptide separation and fractionation by electrodialysis with ultrafiltration membranes.