Topic

Prevention of biofilm formation on implants

Descripton

The so called race for the surface between e.g. osteoblast (or fibroblast) cells and bacteria on implant surfaces is significantly influenced by the initial adhesion. Understanding the interactions between mechanical and electrical forces at the cell-surface interface will provide new opportunities to stimulate and manipulate the spatio-temporal pattern of specific and non-specific cell adhesion events.

Furthermore a method to manipulate adhesion will be investigated, which will exploit the cell-surface interaction differences between different cell types in contact with an implant.

Approach

  • combine afm setup with impedance spectrometer
  • adapt single-cell IDES (Interdigitated Electrode Structure)
  • investigate electric surface potential and simulate field distribution
  • test setup with MC3T3 osteoblast cell line and prokaryotes