Project: Development of a Commercial ElectroCapture Instrument for Mass Spectrometry and UV-detection

Biomotif and MS Vision have formed a "collaboration consortium" targeted at the development and commercialization of Biomotif’s unique ElectroCapture instrumentation. The core of the technology is based on a microfluidic system that utilizes an electric field to perform a multitude of analytical processes. _x000D__x000D_Biomotif holds the IPR for the ElectroCapture Technology and focus its research on the analysis of peptides and proteins by Mass Spectrometry (MS). The company has built several prototypes of ElectroCapture Instruments that have raised interest in industry and research institutes._x000D__x000D_The other P of the consortium, MS Vision, has an extensive knowledge in the analysis of small molecules by MS and UV detection. The company has an application laboratory with mass spectrometers and UV equipment._x000D__x000D_The ElectroCapture Technology is a multifunctional analytical tool that was first developed for protein and peptide analysis. ElectroCapture utilizes an electric field to immobilize charged molecules in a microflow stream by the counteracting effects of hydrodynamic and electric forces. The system consists in a microchannel with two gaps covered with a conductive membrane. An electric field is produced inside the channel by means of the application of a voltage drop between the membranes. Upstream, the channel is connected to a syringe pump and a sample injector. Downstream the system is connected to the mass spectrometer and/or UV detector. Once the charged molecules are captured in the electric field a new solution can be injected. Using this approach, we can obtain desalting, buffer exchange, removal of contaminants and online multistep microreactions. In addition, several microliters of sample can be concentrated and released in a few nanolitres. Furthermore, captured molecules can be released in a single step or sequentially released (separated) by a voltage-gradient scheme. Besides proteins, this technology can be used for the analysis of nucleic acids, hormones and charged small molecules. Due to the inherent multifunctionality and the broad number of different molecules on which this technology can be applied, ElectroCapture has a great potential to become a useful tool for different bioanalytical and pharmaceutical analysis._x000D__x000D_The prototypes built by Biomotif have proven that the technology can be incorporated into a single user-friendly platform. The prototypes have been located into different application areas and they have already delivered results to our clients. In these prototypes, the core of the instrument -the ElectroCapture Cell- is made by hand, which hinders the industrial-production of the instrument and increase batch-to-batch variation of the analytical performance. In this context, the CO aim of this project is to produce a novel ElectroCapture Cell which can be easily mass-produced and will bring analytical robustness to our costumers. On the other hand, this novel design will open a new manner to study the fundamental electrokinetic processes occurring during operation which will lead to an improvement on the operational protocols and discover new applications. Furthermore, it will open the possibility for our costumers to easily translate the electrical characteristics of the Cell and customize a particular application._x000D__x000D_In summary, the novel design will allow commercialisation of the ElectroCapture Technology as a robust and industrial-produced instrument. This will increase our application areas and deepen our knowledge on the fundamental processes involved._x000D_Our customers will get a versatile ElectroCapture Instrument with a new robust Cell that is adjustable to _x000D_their particular analytical applications._x000D__x000D_This new technology could become a compliment as well as a replacement for conventional "Liquid Chromatography" in many areas. _x000D__x000D_Electrocapture technology has also the potential to solve demanding and complex analytical assays that are difficult or impossible to perform with existing analytical instrumentation. _x000D__x000D__x000D__x000D_

Acronym	ElectroCapture (Reference Number: 4343)
Duration	05/05/2008 - 01/04/2011
Project Topic	We want to develop a robust and versatile ElectroCapture cell using flat membranes and novel geometry in order to achieve higher performance and wider analytical capabilities. This will solve complex analytical tasks and compliment or replace established technology such as HPLC and CE.
Project Results (after finalisation)	The CO result of our participation in the project have been the development of a new cell with semipermable flat membrane for the electrocapture instrument. During the development process several versions of the microfluidic cell has been produced in Denmark. They were manufactured in different materials such as acrylic and the inert peek. All in all the new instrument is fully PC controlled with appropiate software.
Network	Eurostars
Call	Eurostars Cut-Off 1

Project partner

Number	Name	Role	Country
2	Biomotif AB	Coordinator	Sweden
2	MS Vision ApS	Partner	Denmark