Kinetics of bacterial adhesion--a stochastic analysis.

In a previous work (Hsu & Wang, 1986), a birth-death type of stochastic model was proposed to analyze bacterial adhesion onto the substrate surface. The model is based upon the assumption that the number of available active sites on the substrate surface is relatively large compared to that of the cells in the system. This assumption is relaxed in the present study, and thus, the problem is considered in a more rigorous manner. The transient behavior of bacterial adhesion is examined through simulation studies. It is found that the present stochastic model should be employed when the number of available active sites is less than or on the same order of magnitude as that of the cells.