Electrochemical measurement of phenothiazine-interacted DNA.

The amount of DNA was measured by using thioridazine, which would be attached to the DNA, as an electrochemical indicator. An indicator (thioridazine) solution, a test solution (DNA solution), and a poly-l-lysine solution were successively placed on a glassy carbon electrode, and the electrode was allowed to dry; DNA was immobilized on an electrode surface by the electrostatic binding between DNA and poly-l-lysine. The electrode was immersed into a buffer solution for 15 min, and then differential pulse voltammetry (DPV) was carried out: the oxidation current peak of thioridazine was observed, and its magnitude depended on the amount of DNA in the solution which was used for preparing the electrode. It could be estimated between 0.2 microg DNA (corresponds to 630 pmol nucleotides) to 20 microg DNA (63 nmol nucleotides) from the oxidation peak current of DPV.