文獻(xiàn)名：Dielectrophoretic separation of randomly shaped protein particles

作者： Tae Joon Kwak^a， Huihun Jung^bc， Benjamin D. Allen^de， Melik C. Demirel^bce， Woo-Jin Chang^fg

^a Nancy E. and Peter C. Meinig School of Biomedical Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA

^b Center for Research on Advanced Fiber Technologies, Materials Research Institute, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

^c Department of Engineering Science and Mechanics, Pennsylvania State University, State College, PA, USA

^d Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

^e Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

^f Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Milwaukee, WI, USA

^g School of Freshwater Sciences, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Milwaukee, WI, USA

摘要：Recently, insoluble protein particles have been increasingly investigated for artificial drug delivery systems due to their favorable properties, including programmability for active drug targeting of diseases as well as their biocompatibility and biodegradability after administration. One of the biggest challenges is selectively collecting desirable self-repairable particles in the spherical morphology with monodispersity to enable consistent levels and rates of drug loading and release. Therefore, technology that allows sorting of protein particles with respect to size and morphology will enhance the design and production of next-generation drug delivery materials. Here, we introduce a dielectrophoretic (DEP) separation technique to selectively isolate spherical protein particles from a mixture of randomly shaped particles. We tested this approach by applying it to a mixture of precipitated squid ring teeth inspired tandem repeat protein particles with diverse sizes and morphologies. The DEP trapping system enabled us to isolate specific-sized, spherical protein particles out of this mixture: after separation, the fraction of 2 µm and 4 µm spherical particles was increased from 28.64% of mixture to 80.53% and 74.02% with polydispersity indexes (PDIs) decreased from 0.93 of mixture to 0.19 and 0.09, respectively. The protein particles show high aqueous swelling capability (up to 74% by mass) that could enable delivery of drug solutions. This work is intended to inspire the future development of biocompatible drug-delivery systems.

關(guān)鍵詞：Protein particle separation；Morphology-based separation；Size-based separation；Dielectrophoresis (DEP)；Protein particles；Protein aggregates