Stable capillary coating with successive multiple ionic polymer layers.

A stable modification of the inner wall of a fused silica capillary was established by a simple coating procedure, successive multiple ionic-polymer layer (SMIL) coating. An anionic polymer was tightly fixed to the capillary wall by the SMIL coating, in which a cationic polymer was sandwiched between the anionic polymer and the uncoated fused silica capillary by noncovalent bonding. The SMIL-coated capillary showed a long lifetime. The endurance of the SMIL-coated capillary was more than 100 runs, and it was also tolerant to organic solvents, 1 M NaOH, and a surfactant. The coating efficiency did not depend on capillary sources, and the relative standard deviation of capillary-to-capillary reproducibility was less than 1%. In this study, dextran sulfate (DS) was used as the anionic polymer, and Polybrene was used as the cationic polymer for SMIL modification. The DS-modified capillary (SMIL-DS capillary) exhibited a pH-independent electroosmotic flow (EOF) from anode to cathode in the pH range of 2-11. The SMIL-DS capillary showed good performance for acidic protein analyses under physiological conditions (pH 7.4). Also, the presence of EOF under acidic conditions permitted new applications. Simultaneous separations of cationic, anionic, and neutral amino acids were achieved by capillary zone electrophoresis, and separations of cresol isomers were achieved by micellar electrokinetic chromatography under the acidic conditions. The SMIL-DS capillary was also useful for fast and precise determination of the pKa of acidic functional groups.