High-performance liquid chromatofocusing and column affinity chromatography of in vitro 14C-glycated human serum albumin. Demonstration of a glycation-induced anionic heterogeneity.

High-performance liquid chromatofocusing of human serum albumin (HSA) after in vitro glycation with purified [14C]glucose has shown that with increasing glycation time a progressive increase in two major anionic fractions (pI 4.8 and 4.65) occurs, while the pI 4.9 fraction decreases in parallel. As early as after 5 days of glycation time, the [14C]glucose content in the anionic fractions was markedly higher than in the pI 4.9 fraction. After 10 and 15 days of glycation, a considerable heterogeneity of 10-15 components could be demonstrated. In addition, phenyl-boronic acid (PBA) affinity chromatography was applied and an enrichment of the more glycated species could be obtained using this method. We conclude that, in contrast to previous reports, glycation of HSA induces anionic heterogeneity (in accordance with the theoretically expected loss of positively charged amino groups) and, although the efficiency in separating non-glycated from monoglycated HSA was found to be very low, an enrichment of these anionic species can be achieved using PBA affinity chromatography.