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Synthesis machine for the cost-efficient fabrication of diagnostic peptides
Publikationstyp
Conference Paper
Date Issued
2017-10
Sprache
English
Author(s)
Start Page
164
End Page
167
Citation
MikroSystemTechnik-Kongress, MST 2017
Contribution to Conference
Scopus ID
Publisher
VDE
ISBN
978-3-8007-4491-6
We have developed a synthesizer robot (Bild 3) that allows us to synthesize 50,000 different peptides on a surface of 10cm<sup>2</sup> in high quality and with minimal material consumption (Bild 5). The robot uses laser in combination with a scan-head to "shoot out" tiny amounts of material from a donor slide, which are transferred to a synthesis slide in the form of nanolayers. A "slide loader" exchanges a vast amount of different donor slides fabricated in advance, whereby the synthesis slide is structured with a variety of different materials. In our case, the synthesis slide is provided with a PEGMA / PMMA polymer layer [1] which serves as a solid phase for peptide synthesis which is started by heating the synthesis slide: the chemically activated amino acid building blocks immobilized in a thin polymer layers can diffuse to the synthesis slide surface, where they couple to free amino groups in very small distinct spots. Thereafter, the non-coupled material is washed away, and the transient Fmoc protective groups are cleaved. As a result, new free amino group appears, to which subsequent layers of chemically activated amino acid building blocks can couple. Thus, the number of the heating steps defines the length of the synthesized peptides [2]. In previous studies, we were able to apply the amino acid building blocks with a computer chip that attracts charged "amino acid particles" to defined pixel electrodes [3]. Later this particle based synthesis was adopted for a 24-color laser printer [4]. In contrast to these earlier particle-based methods, the novel nanoscale-based synthesis of peptide arrays described here is simple to automate and it is suitable for stacking different materials in nanometer-thin layers on top of each other. In future, this should also allow the incorporation of posttranslational amino acids into the peptides. In this case, our cost-efficient arrays can be combined with point-of-care devices for the parallel diagnosis of many diseases at the same time.
DDC Class
600: Technology