Analysis of Polycaprolactone Microfibers as Biofilm Carriers for Biotechnologically Relevant Bacteria

Abstract

Polymeric electrospun fibers are becoming popular in microbial biotechnology because of their exceptional physicochemical characteristics, biodegradability, surface-to-volume ratio, and compatibility with biological systems, which give them a great potential as microbial supports to be used in production processes or environmental applications. In this work, we analyzed and compared the ability of Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas putida, Brevundimonas diminuta, and Sphingobium fuliginis to develop biofilms on different types of polycaprolactone (PCL) microfibers. These bacterial species are relevant in the production of biobased chemicals, enzymes, and proteins for therapeutic use and bioremediation. The obtained results demonstrated that all selected species were able to attach efficiently to the PCL microfibers. Also, the ability of pure cultures of S. fuliginis (former Flavobacterium sp. ATCC 27551, a very relevant strain in the bioremediation of organophosphorus compounds) to form dense biofilms was observed for the first time, opening the possibility of new applications for this microorganism. This material showed to have a high microbial loading capacity, regardless of the mesh density and fiber diameter. A comparative analysis between PCL and polylactic acid (PLA) electrospun microfibers indicated that both surfaces have a similar bacterial loading capacity, but the former material showed higher resistance to microbial degradation than PLA.

Benefits of Polyamide Nanofibrous Materials: Antibacterial Activity and Retention Ability for Staphylococcus Aureus

“…In recent research, not only PA, but also PEO [56], polyacrylonitrile (PAN) [57], and polylactide/polyhydroxybutyrate (PLA/PHB) [58] electrospun filters were proven to be suitable filtration membranes. The common shortcoming of these studies is that after filtration, the captured bacteria contaminate the nanomaterial and might cause further biofilm formation [55,59,60]. This problem was observed and discussed in detail in the study of Rysanek et al [38].…”

Interaction Analysis of Commercial Graphene Oxide Nanoparticles with Unicellular Systems and Biomolecules

“…The interest in the immobilization of microorganisms and microbial enzymes for biotechnological applications has been continuously rising during the last decades because of several factors, including the increased availability of microbial strains and biocatalysts tailored to new applications, the development of new immobilization supports with improved properties, and the need of a shift toward the use of more sustainable processes in different industrial fields [1][2][3][4][5]. The immobilization of microorganisms and enzymes on solid carriers leads to a number of benefits.…”

“…and transformation processes in multiple fields (e.g., agricultural, environmental, food, medical, etc.) has been explored as well to enhance the microbial biological activity, to facilitate their delivery and to separate them more easily from the fermentation broth [3,[5][6][7][8]. Therefore, during the last years there has been an emerging interest in biocompatibility studies for interfacing biological systems with artificial materials.…”

“…This is, in part, due to the enormous functional surface area they provide, which increases the microbial and enzyme loading. Metal and carbon derived nanomaterials, as well as electrospun nanofibers have taken the lead in this area [5,8,10,11]. Regarding the use of nanoparticles, an extensive number of studies have described the properties of different nanomaterials such as magnetic nanoparticles, including iron oxide (Fe 3 O 4 and γ-Fe 2 O 3 ), alloy-based (CoPt 3 and FePt), pure metal (Fe and Co), and spinel-type ferromagnets (MgFe 2 O 4 , MnFe 2 O 4 , and CoFe 2 O 4 ) [12], or carbon derived nanoparticles, namely single and multiwall carbon nanotubes, graphene, graphene oxide, fullerene, etc.…”

Coated Surface on Ti-30Ta Alloy for Biomedical Application: Mechanical and in-vitro Characterization

“…These results are in accordance with the literature. In addition, the antimicrobial surface is desirable properties of biomaterials for biomedical application [37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47] .…”