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MS identification has long been used for PAGE-separated protein bands, but global and systematic quantitation utilizing MS after PAGE has remained rare and not been reported for native PAGE. Here we reported on a new method combining native PAGE, whole-gel slicing and quantitative LC-MS/MS, aiming at comparative analysis on not only abundance, but also structures and interactions of proteins. A pair of human plasma and serum samples were used as test samples and separated on a native PAGE gel. Six lanes of each sample were cut, each lane was further sliced into thirty-five 1.1 mm × 1.1 mm squares and all the squares were subjected to standardized procedures of in-gel digestion and quantitative LC-MS/MS. The results comprised 958 data rows that each contained abundance values of a protein detected in one square in eleven gel lanes (one plasma lane excluded). The data were evaluated to have satisfactory reproducibility of assignment and quantitation. Totally 315 proteins were assigned, with each protein assigned in 1-28 squares. The abundance distributions in the plasma and serum gel lanes were reconstructed for each protein, named as "native MS-electropherograms". Comparison of the electropherograms revealed significant plasma-versus-serum differences on 33 proteins in 87 squares (fold difference > 2 or < 0.5, p < 0.05). Many of the differences matched with accumulated knowledge on protein interactions and proteolysis involved in blood coagulation, complement and wound healing processes. We expect this method would be useful to provide more comprehensive information in comparative proteomic analysis, on both quantities and structures/interactions.

PEGylation of proteins has become an increasingly important technology in recent years. However, determination and characterization of the PEGylation products are problematic especially for the reaction mixture containing various modified proteins, unreacted PEG, and unmodified protein. A comparative study was carried out with two HPLC methods and two electrophoresis methods for characterization of the reaction mixture in PEGylation of HSA with PEG 5000, 10000, and 20000. RP-HPLC fails to give the correct information about the reaction of PEG 20000. Size-exclusion HPLC (SE-HPLC) produced very poor resolution on the PEG 5000 reaction. SDS-PAGE can run multiple samples of all PEGylation but the bands were smeared or broadened probably due to the interaction between PEG and SDS. On the other hand, native PAGE eliminates the problem of PEG-SDS interaction and provides better resolutions for all samples. Various PEGylated products and unmodified protein migrate differentially in native PAGE under nondenatured conditions. The results demonstrated that native PAGE could be a good alternative to HPLC and SDS-PAGE for the analysis of PEG-protein conjugates especially for characterization of the PEGylation mixture.

This paper presents a quality by design (QbD) based development of a novel native PAGE (N-PAGE) method as a low-cost analytical tool for analysis of aggregates of monoclonal antibodies. Comparability to the present gold standard of SEC has been established. The motivation is the fact that SEC requires relatively expensive equipment and consumables, thus making N-PAGE relevant to those academicians and other small companies involved in early-stage development of biotherapeutics that do not have access to SEC, especially in developing countries. Furthermore, SEC suffers from certain disadvantages including the possibility of secondary interactions between the stationary phase and analyte resulting in higher elution time and therefore underestimation of the analyte size. The proposed N-PAGE method can also serve as an orthogonal analytical method for aggregate analysis. A QbD-based approach has been used for development and optimization of the protocol. First, initial screening studies were carried out with parameters including the running buffer pH, running buffer molarity, gel buffer pH, loading dye, sample concentration, and running voltage. Next, optimization of operating parameters was performed using principles of design of experiments. The final optimized protocol was compared to the traditional SEC method and the results were found to be comparable. While N-PAGE has been in use for protein analysis for several decades, use of N-PAGE for analysis of mAb aggregates with data comparable to SEC such as the case presented here is novel.

The effects of agarose gel strips without and with 0.03 m(r) electroendosmosis (EEO) on isoelectric focusing (IEF) were studied. It is shown that only agarose without EEO can be used for IEF. The effects of electrode buffer strips using agarose with different EEO of 0, 0.03, 0.08, 0.20 m(r) on sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) and native PAGE were also studied. It apparently did not affect SDS-PAGE, but affected native PAGE to a certain extent. The higher the EEO value was, the more water was present on the agarose gel strip during a separation. Agarose gel strips with an EEO of 0.2 m(r) are not suitable as electrode buffer strips for native PAGE.