Biofilm formation behaviour of marine filamentous cyanobacterial strains in controlled hydrodynamic conditions

• Type: Article in International Scientific Journal
• Date: 2019

Authors

Maria J. Romeu (Author) FEUP; Patrícia Alves (Author) FEUP; João Morais (Author) Other; João M. Miranda (Author) Other; Ed.D. de Jong (Author) Other; Jelmer Sjollema (Author) Other; Vítor Ramos (Author) Other; Vitor Vasconcelos (Author) FCUP; Filipe J. M. Mergulhão (Author) FEUP

Journal

Title: Environmental Microbiology

Vol. 21 No. 11

Pages: 4411-4424

ISSN: 1462-2912

Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell

Indexing

ISI Web of Knowledge - 28 Citations

ISI Web of Science

Scopus - 33 Citations

Associated Projects

LEPABE - Projeto Estratégico do LEPABE - Laboratório de Engenharia de Processos, Ambiente, Biotecnologia e Energia

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-00R-3H0

DOI: 10.1111/1462-2920.14807

Abstract (EN): Marine biofouling has severe economic impacts and cyanobacteria play a significant role as early surface colonizers. Despite this fact, cyanobacterial biofilm formation studies in controlled hydrodynamic conditions are scarce. In this work, computational fluid dynamics was used to determine the shear rate field on coupons that were placed inside the wells of agitated 12-well microtiter plates. Biofilm formation by three different cyanobacterial strains was assessed at two different shear rates (4 and 40s(-1)) which can be found in natural ecosystems and using different surfaces (glass and perspex). Biofilm formation was higher under low shear conditions, and differences obtained between surfaces were not always statistically significant. The hydrodynamic effect was more noticeable during the biofilm maturation phase rather than during initial cell adhesion and optical coherence tomography showed that different shear rates can affect biofilm architecture. This study is particularly relevant given the cosmopolitan distribution of these cyanobacterial strains and the biofouling potential of these organisms.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific

No. of pages: 14