Enzymophoresis of nucleic acids by tandem capillary enzyme reactor-capillary zone electrophoresis.

Enzymophoresis with coupled heterogeneous capillary enzyme reactor-capillary zone electrophoresis was developed and evaluated in the area of nucleic acids. Ribonuclease T1, hexokinase and adenosine deaminase were successfully immobilized on the inner walls of short fused-silica capillaries through glutaraldehyde attachment. These open-tubular capillary enzyme reactors were quite stable for a prolonged period of use under operation conditions normally used in capillary zone electrophoresis. The capillary enzyme reactors coupled in series with capillary zone electrophoresis served as peak locator on the electropherogram, improved the system selectivity, and facilitated the quantitative determination of the analytes with good accuracy. Also, they allowed the on-line digestion and mapping of minute amounts of transfer ribonucleic acids, and the simultaneous synthesis and separation of nanogram quantities of oligonucleotides.