Network Formation and Sieving Performance of Self-Assembling Hydrogels
- Creators
- Lammertink, Rob G. H.
- Kornfield, Julia A.
Abstract
Self-assembling hydrogels, consisting of aqueous solutions of poly(ethylene glycol)s end-capped with perfluorocarbon groups (Rf−PEGs), were studied for their electrophoretic sieving performance. These materials form physical gels, with the end groups aggregated in hydrophobic cores. The gels display high sieving performance, expressed as a large mobility dependence on DNA size, for short double-stranded DNA fragments even at relatively low polymer concentrations (∼3 wt %). This interesting characteristic can be attributed to the dense packing of interconnected micelles that build up the hydrogel network. The physically connected micelles act as a permanent network on the time scale of DNA migration over the distance between micelle cores. A mobility plateau was observed for intermediate DNA sizes that were probably too large to sieve through the network of interconnected micelles and yet too small to reptate. This plateau was followed by a reptation regime for larger DNA sizes, that has similar resolving characteristics to that observed for entangled linear PEO solutions.
Additional Information
© 2003 American Chemical Society. Received 12 November 2002. Published online 7 November 2003. Published in print 1 December 2003. This research was supported in part by NSF (CTS-9729443 and MRSEC DMR-0080065), a postdoctoral fellowship from The Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research, NWO (R.G.H.L.) and by the W. M. Keck Foundation Fund for Discovery in Basic Medical Research at the California Institute of Technology. We thank Prof. Frank Gomez at the California State University of Los Angeles for helpful discussions.Additional details
- Eprint ID
- 79301
- DOI
- 10.1021/ma0258253
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20170724-112901776
- CTS-9729443
- NSF
- DMR-0080065
- NSF
- Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (NWO)
- W. M. Keck Foundation
- Created
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2017-07-24Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
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2021-11-15Created from EPrint's last_modified field