Combinatorial peptide libraries to overcome the classical affinity-enrichment methods in proteomics

The enrichment of targeted low-abundance proteins is possible by affinity adsorption using selected sorbents. Different categories of very dilute proteins are present in most of biological extracts so that specific affinity methods are unable to address their collective enrichment. Only recently an interesting approach has been proposed associating the affinity of multiple ligands used as a library mode under overloading much beyond the saturation of the affinity mixed bed. The principle and the limits of this technology are reported along with their current and potential applications in various domains.