Hydrophobic interaction governs unspecific adhesion of staphylococci: a single cell force spectroscopy study

• Nicolas Thewes,
• Peter Loskill,
• Philipp Jung,
• Henrik Peisker,
• Markus Bischoff,
• Mathias Herrmann and
• Karin Jacobs

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2014, 5, 1501–1512, doi:10.3762/bjnano.5.163

• surface, single cell force spectroscopy is applied: A single cell of the apathogenic species Staphylococcus carnosus isolate TM300 is used as bacterial probe. With the exact same bacterium, hydrophobic and hydrophilic surfaces can be probed and compared. We find that as far as 50 nm from the surface

• hydrophobic (hydrophilic) surfaces. Keywords: atomic force microscopy (AFM); force spectroscopy; hydrophobic interaction; single cell; Staphylococcus carnosus; Introduction Members of the genus Staphylococcus are known to form extremely resistant biofilms, some of which can cause severe infectious diseases

• [1]. Staphylococcus carnosus is an apathogenic member of that genus and has been described first in the early 1980s [2]. The name Staphylococcus carnosus reflects its important role in meat production as it reduces nitrate to nitrite and prevents food rancidity by producing the anti-oxidant enzymes