there are essentially no impurities in the material essentially the entire surface of the material is available for binding nucleic acids preferably the material is at least about 70 pure about 80 pure about 90 pure about 95 pure about 96 pure about 97 pure about 98 pure about 99 pure about 99 5 pure about 99 9 pure and ideally about 100 pure by weight the resulting surface will exhibit higher loading potential for nucleic acids than does conventional glass surfaces at a microscopic level the silica surface preferably has a three dimensional structure and is not planar an example of a three dimensional structure is an array of silica fibers the surface may be generally be any shape and preferably is macroscopically planar e g a chip or disk or three dimensional e g a sphere or bead the surface properties of the materials may be modified by chemical reactions examples include modifying the hydrophobicity or hydrophilicity of the materials the surface may be constructed entirely of the substantially pure silica or may comprise a layer of substantially pure silica mounted on top of a flat surface such as glass or metal the substantially pure silica may be adhered to the flat surface by an adhesive applied using a solvent or cast directly onto the flat surface substantially pure silica may be purchased from a commercial supplier may be prepared de novo or may be prepared by.