Britton Chance Center for Biomedical Photonics at Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics-Hubei Bioinformatics & Molecular Imaging Key Laboratory, Department of Biomedical Engineering, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430074, Hubei, PR China.
Britton Chance Center for Biomedical Photonics at Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics-Hubei Bioinformatics & Molecular Imaging Key Laboratory, Department of Biomedical Engineering, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430074, Hubei, PR China.
Anal Chim Acta. 2023 Apr 22;1251:341000. doi: 10.1016/j.aca.2023.341000. Epub 2023 Feb 22.
Ionic current rectification (ICR) phenomena conventionally occurs in nanopores which dimensions are comparable to the thickness of their electrical double layers. However, the microscale ICR in a micropore can also exist under some conditions. Here, the charged hydrogel filled conical micropore was constructed to realize microscale ICR. To better understand the micropore ICR, the influences of space charge density of the hydrogel, micropore geometry, the hydrogel filling length as well as the electrolyte concentration and pH were investigated. Furthermore, we developed a PEGDA-based hydrogel filled micropore sensing platform which sensing performance was enhanced due to the weakly charged PEGDA. The promyelocytic leukemia (PML)/retinoic acid receptor alpha (RARA) fusion genes and adenosine triphosphate (ATP) were respectively used as model analytes and the measured detection limits of 0.1 pM were achieved. The successful realization of microscale ICR in a homogenous and functional hydrogel filled micropore suggests that the fabrication, characterization and operation of ICR based devices can be more robust and facilitated for the wider applications.
离子电流整流 (ICR) 现象通常发生在尺寸与电双层厚度相当的纳米孔中。然而，在某些条件下，微孔中的微尺度 ICR 也可能存在。在这里，构建了填充带电水凝胶的锥形微孔以实现微尺度 ICR。为了更好地理解微孔 ICR，研究了水凝胶的空间电荷密度、微孔几何形状、水凝胶填充长度以及电解质浓度和 pH 值的影响。此外，我们开发了一种基于聚乙二醇二丙烯酸酯 (PEGDA) 的填充有水凝胶的微孔传感平台，由于 PEGDA 的带弱电荷特性，其传感性能得到了增强。早幼粒细胞白血病 (PML)/维甲酸受体 α (RARA) 融合基因和三磷酸腺苷 (ATP) 分别用作模型分析物，实现了 0.1 pM 的测量检测限。在均质且功能化的填充有水凝胶的微孔中成功实现微尺度 ICR，表明基于 ICR 的器件的制造、表征和操作可以更加稳健，并为更广泛的应用提供便利。
