Electroosmotic flow modulation for improved electrokinetic preconcentration: Application to capillary electrophoresis of fluorescent magnetic nanoparticles

Abstract

It is reported in this study a new approach for modulation and even suppression of the electroosmotic flow (EOF) to achieve better electrokinetic preconcentration in capillary electrophoresis. This is based on the augmentation of the buffer’s concentrations to very high levels (more than a thousand of mM) without recourse to any dynamic/permanent coating nor viscous gel. The use of large weakly charged molecules as background electrolyte’s constituents allows working at extreme concentration ranges without penalty of high electric currents and Joule heating. By this way, the electroosmotic mobility could be modulated over a wide range (2–60 × 10−5 cm2 V−1 s−1 under alkaline conditions), and suppressed to levels equivalent to those obtained with several neutral coatings. The highest buffer concentrations, and the lowest EOF magnitudes, accordingly, were achieved with diethanolamine/3-(Cyclohexylamino)-1-propanesulfonic acid (ionic strength (IS) of 250 mM, pH 9.5), Tris(hydroxymethyl)aminomethane (Tris)/2-(Cyclohexylamino)ethanesulfonic acid (CHES) (IS of 280 mM, pH 8.7) and triethanolamine/2-(Cyclohexylamino)ethanesulfonic acid (IS of 250 mM, pH 8.5). For demonstration, this new approach was applied for sensitive determination of core-shell magnetic nanoparticles (CSMNPs) having high potential for healthcare applications such as imaging agents for diagnostics and controllable cargos for nanomedicine. Different profiles were achieved for purpose-made and commercial magnetic nanoparticles using CE coupled with light-emitting-diode induced fluorescence (LEDIF) detection. The best performance for EOF-assisted preconcentration and CE-LEDIF of CSMNPs was achieved with these nanoparticles prepared in TRIS/CHES (IS 10 mM, pH 8.4) for preconcentration, and separation under BGE of TRIS/CHES (IS 100 mM, pH 8.4). Compared to the conventional capillary electrophoresis (CE-UV) method for characterization of magnetic nanoparticles, our proposed approach with fluorescent detection and EOF-assisted preconcentration offers almost 350-fold sensitivity improvement. Furthermore, our scheme can be used for monitoring the interaction between CSMNPs and target pharmaceutical molecules, serving for drug delivery development. A preliminary study with two antibiotics using this approach revealed that kanamycin interacts better with the target nanoparticles than amikacin.