Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, FAMU-FSU College of Engineering, Tallahassee, FL 32310, United States.
Colloids Surf B Biointerfaces. 2010 Apr 1;76(2):512-8. doi: 10.1016/j.colsurfb.2009.12.012. Epub 2009 Dec 28.
Effective decontamination of environments contaminated by Bacillus spores remains a significant challenge since Bacillus spores are highly resistant to killing and could plausibly adhere to many non-biological as well as biological surfaces. Decontamination of Bacillus spores can be significantly improved if the chemical basis of spore adherence is understood. In this research, we investigated the surface adhesive properties of Bacillus subtilis and Bacillus anthracis spores. The spore thermodynamic properties obtained from contact angle measurements indicated that both species were monopolar with a preponderance of electron-donating potential. This was also the case for spores of both species missing their outer layers, due to mutation. Transport of wild type and mutant spores of these two species was further analyzed in silica sand under unsaturated water conditions. A two-region solute transport model was used to simulate the spore transport with the assumption that the spore retention occurred within the immobile region only. Bacillus spore adhesion to the porous media was related to the interactions between the spores and the porous media. Our data indicated that spore surface structures played important roles in spore surface properties, since mutant spores missing outer layers had different surface thermodynamic and transport properties as compared to wild type spores. The changes in surface thermodynamic properties were further evidenced by infrared spectroscopy analysis.
有效清除被芽孢杆菌孢子污染的环境仍然是一个重大挑战，因为芽孢杆菌孢子具有很强的抗杀灭能力，并且可能附着在许多非生物和生物表面上。如果了解孢子附着的化学基础，芽孢杆菌孢子的去污就可以得到显著改善。在这项研究中，我们研究了枯草芽孢杆菌和炭疽芽孢杆菌孢子的表面粘附特性。从接触角测量中获得的孢子热力学性质表明，这两个物种都是单极的，具有电子供体的优势。由于突变，这两种物种的外层缺失的孢子也是如此。在不饱和水条件下，进一步在硅砂中分析了这两个物种的野生型和突变体孢子的传输。假设孢子保留仅发生在不可移动区域，使用两区域溶质传输模型来模拟孢子传输。芽孢杆菌孢子对多孔介质的附着与孢子和多孔介质之间的相互作用有关。我们的数据表明，孢子表面结构在孢子表面性质中起着重要作用，因为缺失外层的突变体孢子与野生型孢子相比具有不同的表面热力学和传输性质。表面热力学性质的变化进一步通过红外光谱分析得到证实。
