Dispersion of Pseudomonas Aeruginosa Biofilms

位于宾厄姆顿的纽约州立大学的大卫戴维斯博士获得了一笔赠款，用于分离、鉴定和表征一种负责诱导铜绿假单胞菌生物膜自动分散的因子。 在自然界中，细菌如铜绿假单胞菌通常附着在表面生长，而不是悬浮在液体中（如在试管中的实验室培养液中）。 表面附着的细菌生长被称为生物膜。 所提出的工作的目标是表征生物膜自动分散，以开发新的方法控制细菌生物膜。 通过溶剂提取从废培养基中分离分散诱导因子，并通过色谱法纯化，然后进行标准结构化学分析。 该分析将包括用于官能团鉴定的红外光谱法、质谱法和核磁共振光谱法。 将对隔离因子进行检测，以确定其在整个隔离过程的每个阶段作为分散诱导剂的有效性。 将使用快速筛选技术将含有诱导剂化合物的分离级分添加到模拟生物膜中，并在连续培养生物膜群体的试验中验证。这项工作将包括本科生在学年和夏季学期的研究参与。 在化学和生物学系的学生培训将包括实验室部分的光谱鉴定的因素在用过的培养基和抗生素的分散诱导和非诱导的细菌生物膜的有效性测试。微生物生物膜在感染和工业系统中提出了显着的问题，由于它们的耐药性处理的杀菌剂。 这种抗性在很大程度上是由于生物膜中细胞的聚集性质。 在Davies博士的实验室中已经发现，从铜绿假单胞菌的高细胞密度培养物中回收的无细胞废培养基在外源性添加到生长的生物膜中时能够诱导生物膜自动分散。 拟议的工作预计将提供一种新的方法来控制铜绿假单胞菌生物膜的形成和持久性，并导致在工业，家庭和医疗应用中增强生物膜控制和去除的策略的发展。

A grant has been awarded to Dr. David Davies of the State University of New York at Binghamton to isolate, identify and characterize a factor responsible for inducing autodispersion of Pseudomonas aeruginosa biofilms. In nature, bacteria such as P. aeruginosa often grow attached to surfaces rather than suspended in liquid (such as in a laboratory culture broth in a test tube). Surface-attached bacterial growth is known as a biofilm. The goal of the proposed work is to characterize biofilm autodispersion in order to develop novel methods for the control of bacterial biofilms. The dispersion inducing factor will be isolated from spent culture medium by solvent extraction and purified by chromatography followed by standard structural chemical analysis. This analysis will include infrared spectroscopy for functional group identification, mass spectrometry and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. The isolated factor will be tested to determine its effectiveness as a dispersion inducer throughout each stage of the isolation process. Isolated fractions containing the inducer compound(s) will be added to simulated biofilms using a rapid screening technique and these will be verified in tests with continuous culture biofilm populations. This work will incorporate undergraduate student research participation during the academic year and summer term. Student training in the departments of chemistry and biology will include laboratory sections on spectral identification of factors in spent medium and antibiotic efficacy testing of dispersion induced and non-induced bacterial biofilms.Microbial biofilms in infections and in industrial systems present significant problems due to their resistance to treatment by microbicidal agents. This resistance is due in large part to the aggregated nature of cells in biofilms. It has been discovered in Dr. Davies' laboratory that cell-free spent medium recovered from high cell density cultures of P. aeruginosa is capable of inducing biofilm autodispersion when added exogenously to growing biofilms. The proposed work is expected to provide a novel approach to control biofilm formation and persistence by P. aeruginosa and lead to the development of strategies for enhanced biofilm control and removal in industrial, household and medical applications.