Quantitative affinity chromatography.

The objective of this review is to summarize developments in the use of quantitative affinity chromatography to determine equilibrium constants for solute interactions of biological interest. Affinity chromatography is an extremely versatile method for characterizing interactions between dissimilar reactants because the biospecificity incorporated into the design of the affinity matrix ensures applicability of the method regardless of the relative sizes of the two reacting solutes. Adoption of different experimental strategies, such as column chromatography, simple partition equilibrium experiments, solid-phase immunoassay, and biosensor technology, has led to a situation whereby affinity chromatography affords a means of characterizing interactions governed by an extremely broad range of binding affinities--relatively weak interactions (binding constants below 10(3) M(-1)) through to interactions with binding constants in excess of 10(9) M(-1). In addition to its important role in solute separation and purification, affinity chromatography thus also possesses considerable potential for investigating the functional roles of the reactants thereby purified.