Biofilms have been known to cause contamination of drinking water and reduce the efficiency of wastewater treatment. Despite there are many strategies about reducing surface adhesion or killing bacteria, stubborn biofilms are difficult to eradicate completely and still cause continuous contamination because of the difficulty to find comprehensive and effective targets. Here, we identify a new role for quorum sensing (QS) in regulating bacterial motility during biofilm development. We proposed a mechanism of quorum quenching (QQ) by Cu-containing stainless steel (SS), aiming to interfere bacterial motility which associated with surface-attached bacteria self-organizing into microcolonies in early biofilm and the growth and extension of developmental biofilm. A parallel cell-tracking process was conducted to extract the motility history of multiple cells on a newly colonized surface and movement trajectories of biofilm maturation in situ real-time. Results showed Cu-containing SS enhanced bacterial motility of early biofilm, therefore weakening the colonization. Moreover, the development of bacterial community self-organization was retarded by reducing “trajectory cross-over” during the mature stage. Using engineered strains with deleted QS signal, we confirmed QS played a key role in determining bacterial motility. The QQ by Cu-containing SS ultimately guided bacterial motility towards an unfavorable trend for biofilm development.

中文翻译：

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含 Cu 不锈钢靶标群体感应，干扰细菌运动


众所周知，生物膜会导致饮用水污染并降低废水处理效率。尽管有许多减少表面粘附或杀死细菌的策略，但顽固的生物膜难以完全根除，并且由于难以找到全面有效的靶点，仍然会造成持续的污染。在这里，我们确定了群体感应 （QS） 在生物膜发育过程中调节细菌运动的新作用。我们提出了一种含铜不锈钢 （SS） 的群体淬灭 （QQ） 机制，旨在干扰与表面附着细菌在早期生物膜中自组织成微菌落以及发育生物膜的生长和延伸相关的细菌运动。进行了平行细胞追踪过程，以实时提取新定植表面上多个细胞的运动历史和生物膜原位成熟的运动轨迹。结果表明，含 Cu 的 SS 增强了早期生物膜的细菌运动，从而削弱了定植。此外，在成熟期减少 “轨迹交叉” 延缓了细菌群落自组织的发展。使用具有缺失 QS 信号的工程菌株，我们证实 QS 在确定细菌运动中起关键作用。含 Cu 的 SS 的 QQ 最终引导细菌运动朝着生物膜发展的不利趋势发展。