Analysis of protein therapeutics by capillary electrophoresis: applications and challenges

Capillary electrophoresis (CE) has been increasingly used for the analysis of recombinant protein therapeutics in the biotechnology industry over the past several years. In this paper, an overview of the major applications implemented at Genentech Inc. is presented. The applications highlighted in this article are divided into the following three general areas: (i) CE as a replacement for slab gel electrophoresis, particularly capillary electrophoresis-sodium dodecylsulphate and capillary isoelectric focusing; (ii) CE to monitor protein charge heterogeneity as an orthogonal technique to the traditional on-exchange chromatographic methods; and (iii) CE for carbohydrate analysis, including both oligosaccharide and monosaccharide analysis. Overall, the advantages of these CE-based methodologies include automation, ease of quantification, rapid analysis time, enhanced resolution, and robustness when compared to the traditional methods. There are, however, still some challenges in applying CE for protein analysis, particularly in the area of characterization due to the miniaturization nature of CE.