ADVANCED ANALYTICAL METHODS FOR PHARMACEUTICAL AND DIAGNOSTIC APPLICATIONS

Driving forces for the development of novel analytical technologies in the life-science industry are described. Technologies which either we re developed in Bio-Analytical Research or brought to a reliability re quired for routine applications will be elucidated and, on the basis o f practical examples, the impact of modern analytical technologies on the industrial research and development will be discussed: Optical bio sensors based on evanescent excitation of luminescence allow for real- time monitoring of the binding of active compounds to specific biomole cular recognition sites. Molecular imaging technologies have the poten tial to gain rapid access to physical maps of genomic materials. Capil lary electrophoresis or affinity gel electrophoresis are well suited f or the fast determination of oligonucleotide mixtures in nl amounts of samples. Integrated capillary electrophoresis on chips will allow to multiplex capillary systems at low costs and results in high separatio n efficiencies. MALDI-TOF MS is an easy to operate non-scanning mass s pectrometric instrumentation for the analysis of high molecular weight biopolymers such as immunoglobulins.