A design of nanosized PEGylated-latex mixed polymer solution for microchip electrophoresis

We report here advanced microchip electrophoresis using a nanoparticle doped polymer solution that enables greater separation of DNA. The proposed system is simple and effective without any new apparatus or complicated procedures. Various amounts and sizes (80 nm, 110 nm, and 193 nm) of polymer nanoparticle solutions (PEGylated-latex) were mixed with a conventional polymer solution for microchip electrophoresis. When a 0.49 wt% hydroxyl propyl methyl cellulose (HPMC) buffer solution was mixed with a 2.25 wt% 80 nm-PEGylated-latex a higher separation efficiency and a higher mobility of a wider molecular range of dsDNA (10 bp to 2 kbp) was achieved under low viscosity conditions (<5.5 cP) than in conventional 0.7% HPMC. The separation performance was dependent on the particle size and concentration. Furthermore, the effectiveness of the larger PEGylated-latex (193 nm) was not as high as the smaller one (80 to 110 nm). The observed separation improvement by polymer solution with latex-nanoparticles seems to derive from the balance between wider polymer mesh size and the structural obstacles of particles in the buffer.