2005 Ohio Student Research Forum

Abstract

Nanobiotechnology and DNA Deformation
Ericka McKinney
Spelman College, (Ohio State University) Department of Chemistry
Mentor(s): Dr. James Lee and Shengnian Wang

Many people can benefit from improved drug delivery systems. The electrokinetic flow pattern of particles or DNA in nano or micronozzles can be studied to improve gene delivery devices. Converging and diverging flows are two important flows for flow patterns in 2-dimensional micronozzles. Rigid nanospheres and flexible DNA molecules are used to study the electric field enhanced transport in converging and diverging flow patterns. Electrophoresis (EP) and electroosmosis (EOF) play an important role because the analyte carries a negative charge. The geometry of nanonozzles creates the velocity gradient along restricted taper regions. Due to a large velocity gradient the DNA is susceptible to deformation. The flow of DNA in converging or diverging flow shows different dynamics of how the DNA strand is stretched. To process 2-dimensional microfluidic geometries, photolithography will be used, followed by embossing. The conformation of DNA will be directly observed using fluorescence microscopy. The motion of DNA is studied in electrokinetic flow with different solutions and the effects of channel geometry and internal surface properties of channels are considered. As well, both steady state and dynamics of DNA conformation are investigated. Capillary tube with a sharp end of nanoscale size will also be used in this study. Since the channel size is approximate to the analyte size, the transport of the analyte will be different. In some cases, the molecular model is utilized to stimulate DNA deformations to compare with experimental results. All of these observances are relevant to designing gene delivery strategies and nanofluidic systems for biochemical analysis.