Sieving DNA molecules by length dependence in artificial nano-channel matrices

Nano-channel matrices are designed and fabricated for sieving DNA molecules by length. The length dependence is found to change with the size of the channels. Three regimes can be distinguished: (a) for the matrices with the size of the channels comparable to the persistence length (lp) of DNA molecules (45 nm), the mobility of DNA is found to decrease with the length of the molecules, similar to that found for the gel electrophoresis; (b) as the size of the nano-channel increases, the successful attacking frequency increases for the long molecules. The length-dependence of the mobility reverses; and (c) the Ogston mechanism holds for even larger channels. The short DNA molecules drift faster for the channels with diameter larger than 10 lp. Such a variety of the length dependence is observed for the first time in the electrophoresis in the artificial structures.