The microchip capillary electrophoresis devices were fabricated by using poly(methyl methacrylate)(PMMA) plastic material via an injection-molding process. The molded devices were enclosed by utilizing a mixed organic solvent to another PMMA film. The channel structure was very well defined and the molded channel surfaces were very smooth. The transmissivity was in the range from 91% to 93%(at the wavelength of 400—1 000 nm). In comparison to glass microchannels, the electroosmotic flow(EOF) in native PMMA channels was low. DNA marker separation was demonstrated in these PMMA devices with a high-resolution separation of double-stranded DNA fragments, chip-to-chip and the run-to-run reproducibility was good, and the relative standard deviation(%) values were below 2.2% for run-to-run data and 2.3% for the chip-to-chip comparisons. The PCR amplification products and proteins were analyzed on the PMMA chips. Such devices lead to the production of low-cost, disposable chips suitable for a variety of separation applications, including DNA sizing, DNA sequencing, protein and medical analysis. The detection limits of Rhodamine 6G dye for the unmodified PMMA chip and the modified PMMA chips were 1.0×10 -10 and 6.67×10 -13 mol/L, respectively.
Glass microchips with different structures and functions were fabricated in our laboratory.The basic characteristic of the home-made microchips was evaluated,such as the quality of the etched microchannels,reproducibility of electrophoretic separation,and life time etc..The migration time RSD for Rhodamine B in the same or different microchannels were 2.31% or 2.44%,respectively.The column efficiency in the same glass microchip didn′t declined obviously until 200 consecutive running.Compared to the glass microchip made by Micralyne,the similar separation results were obtained on both kinds of microchips.Since,the cost of the home-made glass microchips is much lower, our home-made glass microchips show a great advantage(over) the commercial microchips in terms of the performance to cost.
