1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to reactive ion etched polymer surfaces and methods of using in various chemical and biological assays.
2. Description of the Related Art
Optimizing surface chemistry to enable immobilization of detection antibodies while retaining bioactivity and minimizing non-specific protein adsorption remains a challenge in the development of robust diagnostic protein microarrays for rapid, high throughput screening of pathogen and toxin exposure. Non-specific protein binding greatly compromises assay sensitivity, so minimizing non-specific adsorption and maximizing the binding ability of antibodies will improve detection limits. Most immobilization strategies developed for protein microarrays involve covalent attachment or non-covalent affinity binding of proteins on glass surfaces, followed by a bovine serum albumin (BSA) blocking step to suppress non-specific binding. Because glass-based microarrays are limited in sensitivity and are particularly susceptible to non-specific background binding, other solid support materials are currently being developed for protein microarray applications. The ideal support surface should provide reasonably strong signals, good signal-to-noise ratios, and an almost negligible background.
Polymers possess desirable bulk physical and chemical properties and are inexpensive and easy to process. However, polymers characteristically exhibit low surface energy and must therefore be modified before use in most applications.
Thus, a need exists for polymer substrates that are suitable for patterned microarrays for high-thoughput assays.