The Surface Science of Microarray Generation–A Critical Inventory

Abstract

Microarrays are powerful tools in biomedical research and have become indispensable for high-throughput multiplex analysis, especially for DNA and protein analysis. The basis for all microarray processing and fabrication is surface modification of a chip substrate and many different strategies to couple probe molecules to such substrates have been developed. We present here a critical assessment of typical biochip generation processes from a surface science point of view. While great progress has been made from a molecular biology point of view on the development of qualitative assays and impressive results have been obtained on the detection of rather low concentrations of DNA or proteins, quantitative chip-based assays are still comparably rare. We argue that lack of stable and reliable deposition chemistries has led in many cases to suboptimal quantitative reproducibility, impeded further progress in microarray development and prevented a more significant penetration of microarray technology into the diagnostic market. We suggest that surface-attached hydrogel networks might be a promising strategy to achieve highly sensitive and quantitatively reproducible microarrays.

Applications of Protein Microarrays in Biomarker Discovery for Autoimmune Diseases

“…Various aspects of protein microarrays, such as the protein probes utilized, the chemical modifications on the microarray surface, and the fabrication and detection methods, could impact the result and even the transition to clinical experiments regardless of whether the array is lab-made or commercial (109)(110)(111)(112). As mentioned above, both full-length proteins and peptides can be supplied as the primary materials for protein microarrays.…”

Polymer Microarrays Rapidly Identify Competitive Adsorbents of Virus-like Particles (VLPs)

“…Polymer microarrays have been developed to facilitate simultaneous investigation of many thousands of chemically unique materials for biologic-material affinity on a single surface [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13] . This high-throughput approach has now been used to identify materials for a range of biomedical applications, such as the inhibition of bacterial biofilm formation 13 and the growth of stem cells with controllable behaviour 8 .…”

“…Polymer microarrays can be easily fabricated using inkjet or contact printing, coupled with in situ polymerisation from low quantities of commercial photocurable monomers. 6 In this work we present a method based on a polymer microarray platform to rapidly identify materials derived from commercially available monomers capable of differential adsorption of virus-like particles (VLPs) in competitive binding experiments. The fabricated array contained monomer units expected to interact with viral surface components via charge-mediated association, and incorporated additional hydrophobic and hydrophilic co-monomers to tune relative binding affinities.…”

Polymer Microarrays Rapidly Identify Competitive Adsorbents of Virus-like Particles (VLPs)

“…Polymer microarrays have been developed to facilitate simultaneous investigation of many thousands of chemically unique materials for biologic-material affinity on a single surface [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13] . This highthroughput approach has now been used to identify materials for a range of biomedical applications, such as the inhibition of bacterial biofilm formation 13 and the growth of stem cells with controllable behaviour 8 .…”