Isoelectric membrane simulator: a computational approach for isoelectric immobiline membranes.

Isoelectric membrane simulator (IMS) is a computer program meant for computation of pH, buffering power (beta), ionic strength (I) and dissociation degree (a) of a mixture of up to 3 buffering and 1 titrant Immobilines, for generating in a reproducible manner isoelectric membranes. Such membranes, of precise isoelectric point, are then used for large-scale protein purification by isoelectric focusing in multicompartment electrolyzers. IMS can be used, in a more general application, for titrating mixtures of buffers to a desired pH value. This versatile program is written in M.Q.BASIC rel. 2.5 and it runs on any IBM hardware or compatible machine supported by MS-DOS. An example of purification of superoxide dismutase in a multicompartment electrolyzer with a set of fixed pI membranes of widely differing composition is shown.