Internal electrolyte temperatures for polymer and fused-silica capillaries used in capillary electrophoresis

Polymers are important as materials for manufacturing microfluidic devices for electro-driven separations, in which Joule heating is an unavoidable phenomenon. Heating effects were investigated in polymer capillaries using a CE setup. This study is the first step toward the longer-term objective of the study of heating effects occurring in polymeric microfluidic devices. The thermal conductivity of polymers is much smaller than that of fused silica (FS), resulting in less efficient dissipation of heat in polymeric capillaries. This study used conductance measurements as a temperature probe to determine the mean electrolyte temperatures in CE capillaries of different materials. Values for mean electrolyte temperatures in capillaries made of New Generation FluoroPolymer (NGFP), poly-(methylmethacrylate) (PMMA), and poly(ether ether ketone) (PEEK) capillaries were compared with those obtained for FS capillaries. Extrapolation of plots of conductance versus power per unit length (P/L) to zero power was used to obtain conductance values free of Joule heating effects. The ratio of the measured conductance values at different power levels to the conductance at zero power was used to determine the mean temperature of the electrolyte. For each type of capillary material, it was found that the average increase in the mean temperature of the electrolyte (ΔTMean) was directly proportional to P/L and inversely proportional to the thermal conductivity (λ) of the capillary material. At 7.5 W/m, values for ΔTMean for NGFP, PMMA, and PEEK were determined to be 36.6, 33.8, and 30.7°C, respectively. Under identical conditions, ΔTMean for FS capillaries was 20.4°C. © 2005 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.