Surface imprinted microhelical magnetic polymer nanocomposite fibers for targeted lysozyme separation

Magnetic microhelical structures have recently drawn attention as microswimmers capable of mimicking bacterial propulsion in the low Reynolds number regime. Such structures can be used in microfluidic bioseparation or targeted delivery and their interaction with proteins is extremely important. In this study we fabricated silica coated magnetic microhelices resembling artificial bacterial flagella like structures via electrospinning magnetite nanoparticle incorporated polystyrene nanocomposite solution followed by silica sol coating. Two model proteins, Lysozyme (Lyz) and Bovine Serum Albumin (BSA), were used for protein imprinting along with a polydopamine layer on the magnetic microhelical substrates. The adsorption mechanism of lysozyme on the molecularly imprinted support system was analyzed using adsorption model fitting (Langmuir, Freundlich and Temkin). Adsorption capacity, selective binding and imprinting factor values were calculated for both imprinted (Lyz and BSA) and non-imprinted samples. A significantly higher adsorption capacity was obtained compared to previously reported studies.