Team:Groningen/Lab/experiments/Biofilm

From 2013.igem.org

Biofilm Growth on different materials

To find out if the Bacillus subtilis strain used in this project can form a biofilm on material often used as implants, an experiment was set up.

The suggested implant material was placed in a petri dish with Sgg medium. The material is partially submerged in the medium and inoculated with the appropriate strain. After incubation the plate is left in a 27°C environment for 5 days. After the incubation time, the total biofilm growth on the material of interest is measured.
Two different implant materials are tested: titanium and plastic. After five days of growth on titanium, there is 3 mm biofilm, starting at the medium growing up on titanium (Figure 1). No biofilm formation was possible on plastic (Figure 2).


Figure 1: Titanium plate with 3 mm of biofilm production.


Figure 2: No biofilm production was seen on plastic.