# Fast protein liquid chromatography of camel α-lactalbumin fraction with radical scavenging activity

El Hatmi Halima, Jrad Zeineb, Khorchani Touhami, Annie Dary, Jean-Michel Girardet

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El Hatmi Halima, Jrad Zeineb, Khorchani Touhami, Annie Dary, Jean-Michel Girardet. Fast protein liquid chromatography of camel α-lactalbumin fraction with radical scavenging activity. Emirates Journal of Food and Agriculture, 2014, 26 (4), pp.309-316. 10.9755/ejfa.v26i4.16178. hal-02635935

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REGULAR ARTICLE

Fast protein liquid chromatography of camel α-lactalbumin fraction with
radical scavenging activity

El Hatmi Halima<fnref n="1" />,<fnref n="2" />*, Jrad Zeineb<fnref n="1" />,<fnref n="2" />, Khorchani Touhami<fnref n="1" />, Dary Annie<fnref n="3" />,<fnref n="4" /> and Girardet Jean-Michel<fnref n="3" />,<fnref n="4" />

Abstract

The aim of this study was to investigate the radical-scavenging properties towards a stable radical cation, ABTS, of *Camelus dromedarius* whey proteins (CWP) separated onto a cation-exchanger by fast protein liquid chromatography. The highest activities were found for CWP and fraction F1 mainly composed of α-lactalbumin. Fractions F2, F3 and F4 contained a mixture of lactoferrin, immunoglobulins G and probably camel whey basic protein (CWBP). These three fractions displayed low radical-scavenging activities. Lactoferrin was eluted almost pure in the last fraction (F5) but did not possess detectable radical-scavenging activity. The present results suggested that the cation-exchange chromatography is of great interest to yield, in a single step, whey protein fractions with various biological activities, i.e. a highly-enriched α-lactalbumin fraction displaying efficient antioxidant activity, a fraction (pool of F2-F4) mainly composed of heavy-chain immunoglobulins potentially interesting for human therapy and a fraction of pure lactoferrin having numerous biological activities such as antimicrobial and immunomodulating properties.

Key words: ABTS, α-Lactalbumin, Antioxidant activity, Camel milk, Radical scavenger

Introduction

It is generally well established that the food
constituents can be used to reduce the risk of
developing or aggravating human disease
conditions. In this regard, functional foods and
nutraceuticals have emerged as adjuvant or
alternative to chemotherapy especially in the
prevention and management of human diseases and
for maintaining optimum health state (Kris-
Etherton et al., 2002). Interest in the camel milk for
human nutrition is increasing due to its distinct
composition and unique biofunctional properties
(e.g. antidiabetic properties; Sboui et al., 2012).

Camel milk possesses vital role in human
nutrition in hot regions and countries. It contains
the essential nutrients found in bovine milk, though
some of them are found in higher concentrations

such as vitamin C, iron, and unsaturated fatty acids
(Al Haj and Al Kanhal, 2010). Besides caseins,
camel whey proteins (CWP) constitute 20–25% of
the total camel milk proteins (Khaskheli et al.,
2005), the majority of them having various
biological activities not found or in a lesser extent
in the bovine milk protein fraction. In contrats to
bovine milk whey proteins, CWP contain large
amounts of heavy-chain antibodies IgG2 and IgG3
which are devoided of light chains, and thus have
the potential to inhibit efficiently enzymes and
micro-organisms (Harmsen and De Haard, 2007;
Daley-Bauer et al., 2010). Lactoferrin (Lf) is
present in much larger amount in camel milk than
in bovine milk (ca. 0.3 g L⁻<fnref n="1" /> and 0.1 g L⁻<fnref n="1" />,
respectively; El Hatmi et al., 2006; Konuspayeva et
al., 2007). A number of preventive properties is
attributed to Lf such as antibacterial, antiviral,
fungistatic, antiparasitic, antithrombotic and
immunomodulatory effects (Darewicz et al., 2011).
β-Lactoglobulin known for its allergenic potential
is lacking in camel whey (Elagamy et al., 2009),
whereas α-lactalbumin (α-LA; SwissProt accession
number P00710) constitutes the main component

Received 12 February 2013; Revised 25 April 2013; Accepted 09
May 2013; Published Online 11 October 2013

<footnote n="1">¹Laboratoire d'Elevage et Faune Sauvage, Institut des Régions Arides de Médenine, Tunisie</footnote>

<footnote n="2">²Département d'Agro-alimentaire, Institut Supérieur de Biologie Appliquée de Médenine, Université de Gabes, Tunisie</footnote>

<footnote n="3">³Université de Lorraine, Unité de Recherche Animal et Fonctionnalités des Produits Animaux (URAFPA), Equipe PB2P, Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy, F-54506, France</footnote>

<footnote n="4">⁴INRA, URAFPA Unité Sous Contrat 340, Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy, F-54506, France</footnote>

<footnote>*Corresponding Author</footnote>

<footnote>El Hatmi Halima
Laboratoire d'Elevage et Faune Sauvage, Institut des Régions
Arides de Médenine, Tunisie</footnote>

<footnote>Email: halima.elhatmi@ira.rnrt.tn</footnote>
(2.2 g L⁻¹ of milk; El Hatmi et al., 2006). An advantage of α-LA may be its beneficial role in the antioxidant system of the neonate (Lien, 2003). The bovine α-LA (Sadat et al., 2011) and the camel α-LA (Salami et al., 2009; 2010) are a source of free radical-scavenging peptides. Therefore, attention is being focused on producing α-LA-enriched formulae because α-LA might have an ability to attenuate oxidative stress occurring in inflammatory bowel disease after oral administration (IBD; Rezaie et al., 2007). The protein or its peptides generated by gastrointestinal digestion might act directly on the inflammatory site in the gut without passing through the intestinal barrier.

This study was undertaken to prepare an α-lactalbumin-enriched fraction possessing a free radical-scavenging activity much better than that of CWP. This activity was investigated spectrophotometrically with the 2,2'-azino-bis(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid) or ABTS method. In this work, cation-exchange chromatography performed by fast protein liquid chromatography (FPLC) revealed a single step efficient method to readily produce α-LA-enriched fraction. In addition, two other protein fractions possessing biological activities of great interest such as fractions containing IgGs with potent therapeutic applications and Lf having antimicrobial properties were also obtained.

# Materials and Methods

## Sample collection

Milk samples from 5 healthy camels (*Camelus dromedarius*) were collected and mixed together. The animals, all belonging to experimental herd of the Livestock and Wildlife Laboratory (Institute of Arid Land, Médenine, Tunisia) were in the third month of lactation (Atigui et al., 2013). Samples were collected manually in sterile bottles once per day usually in the morning. Three aliquots of each sample were immediately stored at -20°C until used.

## Preparation of whey proteins and chromatography

The milk was firstly skimmed by centrifugation (4500 g at 30°C for 20 min). Then, the casein fraction was precipitated at pH 4.2 with 1 M HCl and discarded by centrifugation performed in the same conditions. The supernatant (milk whey) was neutralized with 1 M NaOH, dialyzed against distilled water at 4°C for 72 h and CWP were lyophilized.

Fractionation of CWP was performed by cation-exchange fast protein liquid chromatography

(FPLC) with the ÄKTA-FPLC technology (GE Healthcare, Uppsala, Sweden) by passing sequentially through three Hitrap CM (carboxymethyl) 5/5 columns (1.5 x 2.5 cm) equilibrated in 20 mM tris(hydroxymethyl) aminomethane hydrochloride (Tris/HCl) buffer, pH 8.0 containing 0.02% sodium azide. Volumes of 10 mL of whey proteins (10 g L⁻¹ of Tris/HCl buffer) were loaded onto the three columns and a 0–1 M linear gradient of NaCl in the same buffer was applied at 1 mL min⁻¹. Eluted proteins were detected at 280 nm.

## Electrophoresis

Whey proteins of the different FPLC fractions were separated by sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) in the presence of 1.1% SDS and 5% 2-mercaptoethanol according to the method of Laemmli and Favre (1973) with a 4.9% staking gel and a 15.4% resolving gel running in 0.125 M Tris/HCl buffer, pH 6.8 and 0.38 M Tris/HCl buffer, pH 8.8, respectively. Volumes of 20 µL of samples at 2 g L⁻¹ proteins were loaded in the gel. Proteins were stained for 30 min by 0.1% Coomassie blue R250 in a mixture of 50% ethanol and 10% acetic acid followed by overnight destaining in a solution of 30% ethanol, 7.5% acetic acid and 5% trichloroacetic acid. Molecular mass standards (Precision Plus Protein All Blue Standards) were from Bio-Rad (Hercules, CA, USA).

## Protein concentration determination

The protein concentration was determined by the Bradford method. The bovine serum albumin was used as standard. The results of the assay depend on the number of basic amino acid residues of each protein (Ku et al., 2013) and the data are expressed as mg L⁻¹ equivalent (eq.) to BSA. Each measurement was carried out in triplicates.

## ABTS⁺ radical-scavenging assay

The radical-scavenging assay was carried out according to Sadat et al. (2011), a method adapted from that of described by Re et al. (1999). The stable radical cation ABTS⁺ was produced by dissolving 7 mM ABTS⁺ in 2.45 mM potassium persulfate and by keeping the mixture in the dark for 15 h at room temperature. The ABTS⁺ radical reagent was then diluted with 5 mM sodium phosphate buffer, pH 7.4 to reach an absorbance of 0.70 ± 0.02 at 740 nm. The radical cation was stable in phosphate buffer for at least 1 h at 22°C. The decrease in absorbance in the presence of protein fractions was measured at 740 nm with an
MRX® microplate reader (ThermoLabsystems, Chantilly, VA, USA). Volumes of 150 µL of protein fractions (0-100 mg L⁻¹ eq. BSA) or of Trolox or gallic acid (0-30 µM) dissolved in phosphate buffer were added to 150 µL of the ABTS⁺ reagent and the mixture was incubated for 10 min at 30°C before absorbance mesurement. All the assays were carried out five times. The radical-scavenging activity was calculated as follows:

$$ \text{Activity (\%)} = \left[ 1 - \frac{(A_r - A_b)}{(A_i - A_b)} \right] \times 100 \quad [1] $$

Where: Aᵢ = the absorbance of the initial ABTS⁺ radical, Aₚ = the absorbance of the remaining radical and Aₐ = the absorbance of the blank (phosphate buffer, Aₐ= 0.09).

The IC₅₀ value is defined as the concentration of sample able to transform 50% of ABTS⁺ to ABTS⁺ i.e. when the absorbance of the remaining radical was equal to the scavenged radical. Thus, log (IC₅₀) corresponds to the x-intercept of the curve of log [(Aₚ - Aₐ)/(Aᵢ - Aₚ)] vs. log (concentration of sample).

The Trolox-equivalent antioxidant capacity (TEAC) measures the free radical scavenging capacity of a given substance, as compared to the standard, Trolox. The TEAC (in µmol Trolox equivalent or TE per µmol of a given substance) is the ratio of the gradient of the plot of activity vs. concentration of the given substance over the gradient of the plot of Trolox (Re et al., 1999).

## Results and Discussion

In the present study, we proposed a simple method of separation of CWP by cation-exchange chromatography with the ÄKTA-FPLC technology in order to prepare in single step different fractions containing biologically active proteins i.e. α-LA-, IgGs- and Lf-enriched fractions and to investigate their potential free radical-scavenging activity. Although the anion-exchange chromatography (Ochirkhuyag et al., 1998) or size-exclusion chromatography (Si Ahmed et al., 2013) allow to obtain pure α-LA, these methods have not been revealed enough suitable to recover the IgGs and Lf (Si Ahmed et al., 2013). Elagamy et al. (1996) have achieved the purification of camel milk IgGs by protein affinity chromatography. The preparation of heavy-chain antibodies (IgG2 and IgG3) from camel milk is of great interest. Indeed, after immunization of *Camelidae* species, milk instead of blood serum might be a dietary source of single-domain antibody fragments (VHs) able to bind therapeutic targets. For example, llama's VHs can specifically target the cell receptor domains of toxins of *Clostridium difficile* (Hussack

et al., 2010). In addition, the VHs of small size (ca. 15 kDa) are especially suited for oral immunotherapy because of their stability against very acidic pH, proteolysis and high concentrations of denaturing agents (Harmsen and De Haard, 2007).

## Fractionation of CWP by ÄKTA-FPLC chromatography

After separation of the CWP, the chromatographic fractions were analyzed by SDS-PAGE electrophoresis (Figure 1). Fraction F1 mainly contained the major soluble protein of camel whey i.e. α-LA and camel serum albumin (CSA). As expected, these proteins were not adsorbed onto the cation-exchanger due to their acidic isoelectric points (pHi). The theoretical pHis are 5.01 and 5.60 for the camel α-LA and bovine serum albumin (SwissProt accession number P02769), respectively (the CSA sequence is not available in the databank). The fractions F2 and F3 mainly contained heavy chains H45 and H42 of IgG2 and IgG3, respectively, these IgGs being devoided of light chains (Lauwereys et al., 1998; Daley-Bauer et al., 2010) whereas IgG1, which consisted of both heavy chains H55 and light chains L30 was recovered in fraction F4. The IgGs have generally near-neutral or basic pHis (pHis 6.5-9.5; Igawa et al., 2010) and could be adsorbed onto the cation-exchanger and then desorbed all along the ionic strength gradient. The fraction F4 might also contain the camel whey basic protein (CWBP) isolated for the first time by Ochirkhuyag et al. (1998). According to these authors, CWBP displays apparent molecular mass and pHi of 20 kDa and 9.30, respectively. The fractions F2-F4 also contained Lf at estimated molecular mass of 78 kDa by Elagamy et al. (1996). IgGs and Lf were eluted in several fractions because of their microheterogeneity of their glycan moiety (Zinger-Yosovich et al., 2011). However, fraction F5 contained almost pure Lf highly retained onto the cation-exchange column as shown by SDS-PAGE, which is in accordance to our previous work (El Hatmi et al., 2007). Like CWBP, the camel Lf is a basic protein and has a theoretical pHi of 8.63 (unglycosylated form; UniProt/SwissProt accession number Q9TUM0). As expected, these two proteins were strongly retained onto the cation-exchanger, whereas the acidic α-LA and CSA were directly eluted in the void volume of the column.
<figure><img src="image_2.png" /><figcaption>Figure 1. Cation-exchange fast protein liquid chromatography of camel whey proteins (CWP) onto three successive Hitrap CM columns connected to an ÅKTA-FPLC system and SDS-PAGE analysis of the collected fractions F1–F5. The ionic strength gradient is in dashed line and the chromatogram in solid line. Electrophoretically identified bands are indicated by an asterisk. A.U.: absorbance unit; M: molecular mass standards; Lf: lactoferrin; CSA: camel serum albumin; H55, H45, and H42: heavy-chains of immunoglobulins G of 55, 45, and 42 kDa, respectively; L30: light chains of immunoglobulins G of 30 kDa; CWBP: camel whey basic protein; α-LA: α-lactalbumin.</figcaption></figure>

## Investigation of radical-scavenging activity

Gallic acid and Trolox (soluble analog of vitamin E) are strong radical scavengers that were used in this study as positive controls. A linear relationship was found from the concentration response curve in the range of 0–5 µM gallic acid and 0–10 µM Trolox (Figure 2A). In the present study, the TEAC value of gallic acid was 3 µmol TE µmol⁻¹ showing that gallic acid was a greater free radical scavenger than Trolox as evident from its three-fold higher antioxidant power. Its IC₅₀ was 2.0 µM, close to the IC₅₀ of 2.5 µM determined by Sadat et al. (2011).

Chen et al. (2003) found that the ABTS method was most suitable and sensitive to determine the antioxidant capacity of bovine milk proteins. This method was thus used in this study to assess the

free radical scavenging activity of CWP. The activities of the different fractions were estimated by determination of the IC₅₀ values (Table 1). The best activities were found for CWP and F1 (Figure 2B), respectively, whereas the other fractions did not display any interesting activity. The α-LA of CWP was fully recovered in F1 and was probably responsible of the respective free radical scavenging activities of CWP and F1. It was noteworthy that the basic proteins, IgGs, CWBP and Lf did not possess interesting scavenging power. Particularly, Lf did not show any detectable radical scavenging activity (Table 1). The basic amino acid residues Lys and Arg are not reported to be efficient free-radical scavengers (Hernandez-Ledesma et al., 2005) and might not confer such activity to the basic proteins containing them.
<table><caption>Table 1. IC₅₀ and TEAC values of gallic acid, camel whey proteins (CWP) and the different chromatographic fractions. n.d.: not determined.</caption><thead><tr><th>Sample</th><th>IC<sub>50</sub> (g L<sup>-1</sup> eq. BSA)</th><th>TEAC (µmol TE µmol<sup>-1</sup>)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Gallic acid</td><td>2 µmol L<sup>-1</sup></td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>CWP</td><td>0.15</td><td>n.d.</td></tr><tr><td>F1</td><td>0.20</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>F2</td><td>0.45</td><td>n.d.</td></tr><tr><td>F3</td><td>0.35</td><td>n.d.</td></tr><tr><td>F4</td><td>0.31</td><td>n.d.</td></tr><tr><td>F5</td><td>0.310<sup>6</sup></td><td>0.01</td></tr></tbody></table>

<figure><img src="image_3.png" /><figcaption>Figure 2. ABTS•+ radical scavenging activity determined at 740 nm of (A) Trolox and gallic acid, (B) the camel whey proteins (CWP) and the fraction F1 recovered from the cation-exchange chromatography separation of CWP. The equations of the curves are: (A) y = 22.24 x (R = 0.99) for gallic acid and y = 7.146 x for Trolox (R= 0.99) and (B) y = 0.737 x - 0.118 for CWP (R = 0.99) and y = 0.516 x - 0.118 for F1 (R= 0.9).</figcaption></figure>

The TEAC of a protein mixture could not be compared to another one (the TEAC depends on the molecular mass of the compound tested rather than its weight expressed in g). However, the TEAC of F1 and F5 was calculated on the basis of the molecular masses of α-LA and Lf, the two proteins being considered to be the principal compounds of F1 and F5, respectively.

The TEAC value of F1 was 1 µmol TE µmol⁻¹, showing that the antiradical power of F1 was identical to that of Trolox. This value was, however, lower than that found by Salami et al. (2009) for the camel α-LA (3 µmol L⁻¹). This difference could be explained by the fact that F1 was a mixture of several proteins that underestimated the TEAC value of α-LA contained in F1. Recently, Sadat et al. (2011) have reported that bovine α-LA is a source of five highly antioxidant peptides and amongst them, Leu-Asp-Gln-Trp and Ile-Asn-Tyr-Trp exhibit remarkable free radical-scavenging activities towards ABTS⁺. These two peptides possess a Trp residue at their

carboxy-terminal extremity. According to Tsopmo et al. (2011), in the presence of free radicals, Trp can lose the labile hydrogen linked to the nitrogen of its indole ring leading to produce a radical stabilized by electron delocalization. For these authors, Trp plays a crucial role in the ability of proteins or peptides to scavenge free radicals. The addition of an extra Trp residue at the amino-terminal extremity of peptide Ile-Ser-Glu-Leu-Gly-Trp significantly increases its antioxidant power (Tsopmo et al., 2011). The camel α-LA possesses five Trp residues on its sequence, whereas the bovine counterpart contains only four. The presence of an additional Trp residue in the case of the camel sequence might contribute to its better radical scavenging power than that of the bovine protein reported by Salami et al. (2009).

On the other hand, Salami et al. (2010) have reported that CWP are a source of hydrolysate with significantly higher free radical-scavenging properties than bovine whey protein hydrolysate. Hernandez-Ledesma et al. (2005) have reported
that the lowering of the number of peptide bonds
has an increasing effect on the antioxidant activity
of the constituent amino acids of small peptides
(typically with molecular masses lower than 1000
Da). In the case of the bovine species, α-LA
hydrolysate obtained by thermolysin action
displays a high and similar free radical-scavenging
power than the source protein, since no
improvement of the activity has been observed
after enzyme treatment (Sadat et al., 2011). By
taking into consideration the results reported by
Salami et al. (2010), it would be thus interesting to
determine in a further work if enzyme hydrolysis of
the camel proteins contained in F1, mainly α-LA,
would be required to enhance the antioxidant
activity of this protein fraction.

The TEAC value (0.01 µmol TE µmol⁻¹) of
pure Lf eluted in F5 was very low indicating that
this protein did not possess any antiradical
properties. It is however reported that Lf possesses
antioxidant properties. In fact, these properties are
rather related to its capacity to bind iron and
therefore to inhibit the Fenton reaction than to any
free radical-scavenging activity (Belizy et al.,
2001). The main property of Lf is that it is a source
of antimicrobial peptide named lactoferricin (Lfcin;
Gifford et al., 2005). The Lfcin is produced by the
gastric protease pepsin and it would be thus
interesting to investigate the possibility of camel Lf
to be a source of Lfcin-like peptide.

Conclusion

The cation-exchange chromatography enabled
us to produce an α-LA-enriched fraction that was
not retained on the column. Thus, this method may
be adapted for high volumes of camel whey with
e.g. fractionation onto CM Sephadex medium to
readily prepare large quantities of α-LA-enriched
fraction. The latter displayed a greater antioxidant
power and might therefore have capability to
attenuate oxidative stress occurring in IBD after
oral administration. The other fractions did not
display any interesting free radical-scavenging
activity and this might seem to be related to their
basic property. However, the strongest adsorbed
protein, Lf, was recovered almost pure and may be
used for its various biological activities i.e.
antimicrobial, antithrombotic and
immunomodulatory effects, whereas the
intermediate fractions containing the heavy-chain
IgG2 and IgG3 may also be valorized in
immunotherapy.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the Ministère
des Affaires Etrangères (France) for supporting Dr.
Halima El Hatmi's stay (SSHN grants) in
URAFPA (Université de Lorraine, France)
laboratory and the MESR for (Ministère de
l'enseignement supérieur et de la recherche
scientifique) for financing this research and Z.
Hafeez (URAFPA, Université de Lorraine) for
manuscript corrections.

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