Analysis of polyamidoamine dendrimers by isoelectric focusing

Polyamidoamine dendrimers have been studied extensively for their potential applications in nanomedicine. Their uses as imaging, drug, and nucleic acid delivery agents are nearing clinical trials. As such, characterization of polyamidoamine dendrimers and their nano-devices is of immense importance for monitoring the efficiency of their synthesis, purity, and quality control of manufactured products as well as their in vivo behavior. We report here the analysis of polyamidoamine dendrimers possessing various cores and surface groups with a simple and inexpensive isoelectric focusing method. The isoelectric points of the dendrimers were readily determined from a calibration plot generated by running proteins with known pI values. The isoelectric points for various surface-modified polyamidoamine dendrimers ranged from 4 to 9. Polyamidoamine dendrimers possessing terminal hydroxyl groups gave a pI > 7, while those with terminal carboxyl groups exhibit a pI < 7. Generation number and cores of the dendrimers did not significantly affect their isoelectric points. Isoelectric focusing thus offers another important tool for characterizing these nanomolecules.