Recovery of gangliosides from aqueous solutions on styrene-divinylbenzene copolymer columns

An investigation was made using a styrene-divinylbenzene copolymer as a solid phase sorbent to recover gangliosides from aqueous solutions. A comparison with octadecyl-bonded (C18) silica gel showed that the general procedure used to purify gangliosides on C18 silica gel could be used with the copolymer. The yield of gangliosides depended on various parameters such as the composition of the conditioning solution, the salt concentration of the loading solution, and the amount of applied gangliosides per gram of copolymer. In optimal conditions, the recovery of gangliosides and other lipids present in the upper phases of partition was higher than 95%. Using radiolabeled gangliosides, it was found that gangliosides present in serum-containing medium could also be quantitatively recovered on copolymer, provided the medium was diluted with an equal volume of methanol prior to its application onto the column. The major advantage of the copolymer is its high stability in acidic or alkaline conditions that allows multiple cycles of cleaning and reconditioning of the sorbent without alteration of its chromatographic properties.