Titanium dioxide as chemo-affinity chromatographic sorbent of biomolecular compounds - Applications in acidic modification-specific proteomics

Characterization of the biomolecules involved in molecular processes occurring in biological systems such as the human cell remains central to biology, biotechnology, and medicine. One of the preferred methods of selectively purifying specific classes of biomolecules from complex biological matrices for further characterization is affinity chromatography, which relies on the specific interaction between an analyte in solution and a solid adsorbent. Titanium dioxide-based affinity chromatography has proven to be a versatile tool in enrichment of various compounds such as phosphorylated biomolecules due to its unique ion and ligand exchange properties and high stability towards pH and temperature. Recently, titanium dioxide chromatography was introduced in proteomics as a highly specific method for enriching phosphorylated peptides - a method, which has been widely adapted by the field of phosphoproteomics. Additional studies have shown the potential of this sorbent in purification of other acidic post-translational modified peptides, such as sialylated glycopeptides, thereby targeting the sialiome, defined as the content of sialic acid containing glycoproteins of a given cell, body fluid or tissue. The development of TiO2-based chromatographic strategies for separation of various biomolecules from its introduction for small molecules more than 20 years ago until recent proteomics applications today will be reviewed here. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.