title: Influence of surface conditioning and morphology on biofouling
creator: Thome, Isabel
subject: 540
subject: 540 Chemistry and allied sciences
description: Biofouling, the undesired colonization of surfaces, is a major  problem for marine-related industries. To prevent unwanted effects caused by  biofouling, suitable non-toxic coatings for the marine environment are required.  Conditioning, i.e. the adsorption of proteins and macromolecules influences, as  surface chemistry and morphology do, the settlement of fouling oragnisms. Investigating  the temporal dynamics of conditioning film formation on functionalized  self assembled monolayers (SAMs), it was shown that the obtained film thickness  of about 10Å to 20Å is independent of the surface chemistry but differences  occur concerning the composition of these films. While on hydrophilic surfaces  more proteinaceous compounds are detectable, the hydrophobic surfaces show a  lower intensity of proteins. Furthermore, is was shown that in standard Ulva linza  spore settlement assays the influence of a molecular conditioning layer is likely  to be small, but by increasing pre-conditioning time this influence gains importance  and should be considered in long term experiments. Preconditioning also  resulted in detectable surface differences in field studies. It was found that preconditioned  samples which contain more proteinaceous compounds seem to be more  attractive for settlement. Experiments with matured laboratory biofilms formed  by Pseudomonas aeruginosa demonstrated that using a protein-rich medium results  in conditioning film formation. Conversely, surface conditioning is reduced  when a media containing a smaller amount of proteins is utilized. Furthermore,  it was observed that surface chemistry has no remarkable effect on the fraction  of inoculated bacteria that adhere to a surface.  Finally, inspired by the nanostructured skin of dolphins, electron-beam lithography  was utilized to create a honeycomb topography made of poly(N-isopropylacrylamide)  (PNIPAM). The evaluation showed that structures from 0.75 μm to  2.5 μm in diameter reduce Ulva settlement in comparison to a smooth PNIPAM  surface. It should be noted, that wet polymer structure heights in the range of  only 0.01 μm do have an effect on spores with a body size of around 5 μm.
date: 2013
type: Dissertation
type: info:eu-repo/semantics/doctoralThesis
type: NonPeerReviewed
format: application/pdf
identifier: https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserverhttps://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/15176/1/Dissertation_Isabel%20Thome.pdf
identifier: DOI:10.11588/heidok.00015176
identifier: urn:nbn:de:bsz:16-heidok-151766
identifier:   Thome, Isabel  (2013) Influence of surface conditioning and morphology on biofouling.  [Dissertation]     
relation: https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/15176/
rights: info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
rights: http://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/help/license_urhg.html
language: eng