Characterization of weak hydrophobic composite sorbents and their application to the isolation of bacterial lectin

Composite sorbents based on wide-pore glass and silica coated with N-butyl polyacrylamide (butyl-PA-glass and butyl-PA-silica) were studied. The surface tension of butyl-PA-silica is 50–55 mJ/m2 as evaluated by the sedimentation volume technique. The linear dependences of log k′ on ammonium sulphate concentration were determined by isocratic chromatography of the dipetide Trp-Trp and lysozyme on butyl-PA-glass. Both solutes were shown to have a weaker retention on butyl-PA-glass than on butyl-Toyopearl 650C. This weaker retention is beneficial in the purification of sialic acid-binding lectin from Bacillus subtilis.