ABSTRACT
Boronate affinity chromatography can be defined as a chromatographic method that uses a boronic acid as an affinity ligand. Retention in this technique is based mainly on the interaction between boronic acids and cis-diol compounds. The binding between borate and cis-diols was discovered more than 100 years ago. By the 1940s, the interaction between borate and cis-diols had been employed as a tool in the analysis of carbohydrates [1]. In the 1950s, borate/cis-diol interactions were used for separations in zone electrophoresis by employing borate buffers [2], and in the 1960s these same buffers were used with borate/cis-diol systems in ion-exchange chromatography [3]. However, it was not until the 1970s that researchers developed immobilized boronate columns [4].
