ABSTRACT
Liquid column chromatography and affinity chromatography are widely used for separating and purifying macromolecules. Quantitative studies of the reaction between solution-phase molecules and molecules bound to beads in a column are assuming increasing importance because the reactions are analogous to those between ligand- and cell-bound receptors. This chapter is concerned primarily with the theoretical basis for determining thermodynamic and kinetic constants governing macromolecular interactions. It discusses the connection between rate constants and the molecular environment of the interaction in an approximate, intuitive, and semiquantitative manner. The chapter reviews the phenomenology of rate constants and the relative contributions of motion and chemical reaction to their values first in a uniform mixture in which motion is diffusive and then in a convective environment. The chapter discusses the relation between the reactive part of the rate constant and the forces that exist between beads and molecules in a chromatography experiment. It also discusses chromatography model with nonlinear sorption-desorption kinetics.
