Separation of amino acids with simulated moving bed chromatography

Authors have constructed an automatized four-column large laboratory scale (I.D. = 50 mm, L = 500 mm) simulated moving bed (SMB) equipment. The applied model system for separation of biomolecules is glycine, l-phenylalanine, water and Sepabeads SP825 adsorbent. The authors determined the adsorption equilibrium data and the packing characteristics. The operating conditions of SMB equipment were calculated with the help of the Morbidelli variables. During the SMB experiments, glycine and l-phenylalanine were separated in water on Sepabeads SP825 with an average particle size 0.3 mm at temperatures 20 °C and 60 °C. The measurement series were carried out on a four-column three-zone open loop SMB. Both l-phenylalanine and glycine were produced with more than 99.9% (m/m) purity and 99% yield at productivity 1.7–3.7, with productivity 3.7–8.1 mg/(g adsorbent h) in case of 2-1-1-0 column configuration. The measured and the calculated data agreed well.