Hydroxyethylcellulose electrophoresis

Ruhr s group studied the separation of double- and single-stranded DNA restriction fragments in capillary electrophoresis with polymer solutions under alkaline conditions in epoxy-coated capillaries and found that at pH 11 the theoretical plate numbers exceeded several millions [96], At pH 12, single-stranded DNA molecules were still well separated in entangled hydroxyethylcellulose (HEC) solutions, but the resolution decreased significantly in dilute polymer solutions. 

Bashkin, J., Marsh, M., Barker, D., and Johnston, R., DNA sequencing by capillary electrophoresis with a hydroxyethylcellulose sieving buffer, Appl. Theor Electrvphor., 6, 23, 1996. 

Woolley et al. [5] have successfully integrated silicon PCR reactors with glass capillary electrophoresis (CE) chips (Fig. 2). They directly connected the PCR chamber and the CE chip through a micropattemed channel filled with a hydroxyethylcellulose sieving matrix. They have shown that the PCR amplification of a p-globin target cloned in M13 took only 15 min as well as the CE separation was completed within 120 s, providing a total PCR-CE analysis time under 20 min. In addition, they also... 

We begin with Barron, et al, who reported mobilities of restriction fragments in solutions of hydroxyethylcellulose, hydroxypropylcellulose, and linear poly-acrylamide(5,6). Barron, et al. found that dilute polymer solutions are effective separatory media for DNA fragments. Dilute polymer solutions had previously not been expected to be effective separatory media, because the theoretical models being invoked in the electrophoresis literature referred only to gels and nondi-lute solutions. In these models, interpenetrating polymer coils were claimed to form evanescent separatory pores. In dilute solution, polymer coils do not interpenetrate, so the hypothesized pores should not be present, and therefore there was expected to be no separation. Barron, et al. concluded that they had evidence for a new mechanism for DNA separation at low matrix concentration, a mechanism distinct from the pore formation mechanisms presumed active at large c(6). 

Hammond, etal. studied monodisperse 167 kbpT2 DNA undergoing pulsed-field electrophoresis in 0.01-0.1 % wlw hydroxyethylcellulose(19). Oscillating fields have less effect on electrophoretic motion when the matrix concentration is small. The conformation fluctuations reported by Shi, et al, continued to be seen(16). The observed mechanics of DNA migration did not differ qualitatively between nominally dilute and and nominally semidilute matrix solutions. Hammond, et al concluded that there exists a unified treatment of DNA electrophoresis that covers dilute and nondilute solutions, and steady and pulsed applied electric fields. 

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