Evaluation of charged molecules content of plant polysaccharides by aqueous size exclusion chromatography

Aqueous size-exclusion chromatography (SEC) equipped with refractive index (RI) and multiangle laser light scattering (MALLS) detectors were applied to evaluation of charged molecules content in a series of polysaccharide derivatives with different average molar mass (MM) values. It was shown that a minor amount of residual charged groups in the polysaccharide chains caused a polyelectrolyte expansion effect and neutral fractions of birch xylans, larch arabinogalactans (AG) and galactoglucomannans (GGM) were separated from neutral molecules in various concentrations of the injected samples.