A power compensated differential scanning calorimeter for protein stability characterization

摘要

Highlights•A MEMS-based differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) is presented to characterize the protein stability. The micro-DSC showed high performance with a 6V/W sensitivity and a 250nJ/K resolution.•This microfabricated sensor used PDMS (Polydimethylsiloxane) and polyimide to construct the adiabatic chamber (1μL) and used temperature sensitive vanadium oxide as the thermistor material.•We implement a feedback control system to achieve the power compensation detection mode on the microfabricated DSC.•This device successfully characterizes a IgG1 antibody (mAb1) sample and the result is compared with an advanced commercial DSC.•This device could potentially lead to a reduction in the cost and time for the drug formulation in the pharmaceutical industry.AbstractThis paper presented a power compensated MEMS differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) for protein stability characterization. In this microfabricated sensor, PDMS (Polydimethylsiloxane) and polyimide were used to construct the adiabatic chamber (1μL) and temperature sensitive vanadium oxide was used as the thermistor material. A power compensation system was implemented to maintain the sample and reference at the same temperature. The resolution study and step response characterization indicated the high sensitivity (6V/W) and low noise level (60μk) of the device. The test with IgG1 antibody (mAb1) samples showed clear phase transitions and the data was confirmed to be reasonable by comparing it with the results of commercial DSC’s test. This device used ∼1uL sample amount and could complete the scanning process in 4min, significantly increasing the throughput of the bimolecular thermodynamics study like drug formulation process.