On May 12th, the biaseparations.com website will be retired and migrated tosartorius.com.Learn moreabout our combined offering today!

Why you need monoliths to purify your biomolecules

CIM monoliths were designed with unique operating properties that make them ideally suited to the challenging requirements of purifying very-large biomolecules such as virus particles, vesicles, proteins, RNAs, plasmids and other forms of DNA. As high-stake molecules take center stage in the biopharma industry, their specific properties step into the downstream process development spotlight.

Large molecules impose special requirements because they are vulnerable to shear stress and have slow diffusion constants. As a consequence, slow process speeds, low capacities and reduced recovery make traditional chromatography media insufficient.

This is where monoliths come in. Sartorius BIA Separations monoliths remove critical bottlenecks hampering downstream purification. Monoliths in chromatography are defined as single-unit structures with highly interconnected convective channels distributed homogeneously throughout the entire bed. No-void-space design minimizes shear and significantly improves the process recovery. Characteristic large channels are easily accessible (even for the largest of the molecules) and offer high binding capacities. Absence of dead-end pores renders mass transport relying exclusively on mass convection, freeing chromatography media of diffusion-imposed limitations.

Alongside preparative applications, CIM monolith design removes carryover and enables resolution unaffected high-speed analytics. Separations times ranging from seconds to a few minutes permit rapid process development scouting and in-process analysis to complement other analytical methods.

Monoliths come prepacked and prevalidated - you will never need to pack them yourself. And if you happen to pump air through them, you still do not need to repack. Displace the air with buffer and you are back in business.

To sum things up

  • If you want to avoid column packing, unpacking, and repacking, use monoliths.
  • If you want the highest capacity for large proteins, DNA plasmids, viruses, and extracellular vesicles, use monoliths.
  • If you want the shortest process time, fastest in-process analysis, and highest facility capacity, use monoliths.
  • If you want the highest resolution, fewest process steps, use monoliths.
  • If you want the lowest shear, highest native product recovery, use monoliths.

For in-depth explanation of monolith support properties and advantages start with: "Architecture of chromatography media and devices".