Methods to study microbial adhesion on abiotic surfaces

Abstract

Microbial biofilms are a matrix of cells and exopolymeric substances attached to a wetand solid surface and are commonly associated to several problems, such as biofouling and corrosionin industries and infectious diseases in urinary catheters and prosthesis. However, these cells mayhave several benefits in distinct applications, such as wastewater treatment processes, microbial fuelcells for energy production and biosensors. As microbial adhesion is a key step on biofilm formation,it is very important to understand and characterize microbial adhesion to a surface. This studypresents an overview of predictive and experimental methods used for the study of bacterial adhesion.Evaluation of surface physicochemical properties have a limited capacity in describing the complexadhesion process. Regarding the experimental methods, there is no standard method or platformavailable for the study of microbial adhesion and a wide variety of methods, such as colony formingunits counting and microscopy techniques, can be applied for quantification and characterization ofthe adhesion process.