Isolation and purification of lecithin by preparative high-performance liquid chromatography

Mixed-chain, multispecies, egg yolk-derived lecithin was isolated and purified on a silica column with isocratic elution. A method development column (20 x 0.46 cm I.D.) packed with YMC 15-30 microns, 120 A spherical silica and a mobile phase consisting of 5 mM ammonium acetate in acetonitrile-2-propanol-methanol-water (80:13:5:12) was used to separate the lecithin from other phospholipids. The mobile phase conditions for the method development system was adopted for two types of preparative HPLC systems: a Separations Technology SepTech NovaPrep 5000 system with a 20 x 1.93 cm I.D. column and a ST/800A system with a 20 x 5.00 cm I.D. Annular Expansion (A/E) column. The maximum load was 50 microliters of crude solution (2 mg) for the method development column, 0.90 ml (35 mg) for the 20 x 1.93 cm I.D. column and 6.0 ml (240 mg) for the 20 x 5.00 cm I.D. A/E column. The flow-rates were 2, 35 and 235 ml/min, respectively. The fractions collected from the preparative systems were analyzed for purity by analytical-scale high-performance liquid chromatography and by thin-layer chromatography with selective detection with molybdenum blue for phospholipids and detection of all organic compounds by sulfuric acid. Purity of the recovered lecithin was greater than 99%.