Preparation of Boronic Acid-Functionalized Silica Nanocomposites for Selective Enrichment of Glycoproteins

A facile method was developed for synthesis of boronic acid-functionalized silica nanocomposites (SiO2-BA) by 'thiol-ene' click reaction, where silica nanoparticles were synthesized by using tetraethoxysilane (TEOS) and gamma-mercaptopropyl trimethoxysilane (gamma-MPTS) as precursors. The morphology and structure properties of the resultant SiO2-BA were characterized by transmission electronic microscopy (TEM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), and Brunner-Emmet-Teller measurements (BET). The adsorption behavior of the SiO2-BA for glycoproteins was evaluated. Under the optimized conditions, the SiO2-BA exhibited higher adsorption capacity towards glycoproteins (ovalbumin, OVA, 7.64 mu mol/g) than non-glycoproteins (bovine serum albumin, BSA, 0.83 mu mol/g). In addition, the practicality of the SiO2-BA was further assessed by selective enrichment of glycoproteins from egg white samples.