Abstract: A method has been established for the separation and identification of metallothionein (MT) isoforms and sub-isoforms by liquid chromatography. A mixture of rabbit liver MT was separated on a DEAE A-25 weak anion-exchange chromatographic (AEC) column. Inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometer (ICP-MS) was used for off-line detection of Zn in each fraction. The two main MT isoforms, MT-1 and MT-2, were isolated. The collected MT isoform fractions were then desalted by a homemade Sephadex G-25 size exclusion chromatographic (SEC) column. Afterwards, the sample was separated on a C18 reversed-phase column with UV detection at 210 nm. Different separation conditions were discussed and several sub-isoforms of MT were well separated at pH 2.0. The sub-isoforms were finally characterized by on-line HPLC-ESI-MS. The isoforms and sub-isoforms were well separated on a reversed-phase column under optimized chromatographic conditions and the detection results of ESI-MS were in agreement with the data found in literature. The method developed can be well used for the separation of metallothionein isoforms and sub-isoforms.

Key words: gel exclusion chromatography, isoforms , metallothioneins, reversed-phase high performance liquid chromatography, ion-exchange chromatography