Nucleotide triphosphate immobilised on a support and their use in nucleic acid synthesis

1. A polymer synthesis method which comprises the steps of:

(a) providing a monomer immobilised to a support moiety via a cleavable linker, wherein the monomer is a deoxynucleotide triphosphate (dNTP), or a nucleotide triphosphate (NTP);

(b) providing a polymer having an initiator nucleic acid sequence of length (N);

(c) providing a nucleic acid synthesis catalyst to couple the initiator nucleic acid sequence to the immobilised monomer to create an immobilised, coupled polymer of length (N+1);

(d) removing any uncoupled polymers; and

(e) cleaving the immobilised, coupled polymer of length (N+1) from the support moiety.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein step (d) comprises a washing step.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the nucleic acid catalyst is an enzyme selected from terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase (TdT), poly (U) polymerase, poly (A) polymerase, and polymerase theta (PolQ).

4. The method of claim 1 , which comprises providing the product of step (e) to an additional deoxynucleotide triphosphate (dNTP) or nucleotide triphosphate (NTP) immobilised to a support moiety and then repeating steps (b) to (e) until a nucleic acid of desired length is synthesised.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the support moiety is selected from glass, silicon, gold, or plastic.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the support moiety is selected from: a particle, nanoparticle, ultrafine particle, nanomaterial, membrane, or any other material of 1-1000 nm in size, or of 1-100 nm, or of ≥1 nm, or of ≥2 nm, or of ≥3 nm, or of ≥5 nm, or of ≥10 nm in size.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the monomer immobilised on the support moiety is a dNTP/NTP of formula (I):

wherein R 1 and R 2 independently represent H or OH or a protected derivative thereof;

X represents hydrogen or one or more phosphate groups;

W represents a base;

Y represents a cleavable linker; and

Z represents a support moiety.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein the cleavable linker is selected from: a masked hemiaminal ether site, sulfmoc, m-chloro-p-acyloxybenzyl carbamate and 4-azidobenzyl carbamate; a linker comprising a phosphine moiety; a linker comprising a silicon containing site; a linker comprising a disulfide site; a linker comprising a cyanoethyl site; and a linker comprising a photocleavable site.

9. The method of claim 7 , wherein the method is performed on a microfluidic device, electrowetting-on-dielectric device, an inkjet device or other printing platform.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein the device is a electrowetting-on-dielectric device.

11. The method of claim 1 , wherein the support moiety is a particle, bead, nanoparticle, or a nanobead.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the support moiety comprises quantum dots.

13. The method of claim 11 , wherein the support moiety comprises magnetic particles.

14. The method of claim 1 , wherein the support moiety comprises a metal, metalloid or metal alloy particles, wherein the metal, metalloid or metal alloy particles are selected from gold, silver, and selenium.

15. The method of claim 11 , wherein the support moiety comprises metal oxide particles, wherein the metal oxide particles are selected from oxides of Al, Mg, Zr, Ce, Ti, Zn, Fe, and Sn.

16. The method of claim 11 , wherein the support moiety comprises silica particles.

17. The method of claim 11 , wherein the support moiety is an organic polymer.

18. The method of claim 17 , wherein the organic polymer is selected from agarose particles, polystyrene particles, graphene, and graphene oxide.

19. The method of claim 7 , wherein the base is a purine or a pyrimidine.