Challenges Associated with Membrane Separation of Polypeptides and Relevant Solution Strategies

Polypeptides exhibit significant health-promoting effects through diverse biological activities, including antihypertensive, antidiabetic, anti-cancer, antimicrobial, and antioxidant properties. Membrane technology offers an efficient separation approach for polypeptides due to its high efficiency, low energy consumption, operational simplicity, and environmental sustainability. This review briefly described the advancements in membrane separation of polypeptides and highlighted the major implementation challenges, such as membrane fouling, peptide adsorption losses, and compromised separation efficiency caused by peptide aggregation. Contributing factors for each issue based on the progress and reports of relevant research were analyzed. And solutions and strategies were also summarized as feed pretreatment, operational parameter optimization, aggregate elimination, and membrane surface modification. These approaches could reduce product loss and enhance peptide yield during purification. This review can provide reference for the research on efficient membrane separation of polypeptide products.