Biofilms invade microbiology
Potera, C.
Science 273(5283): 1795-1797
1996
ISSN/ISBN: 0036-8075 PMID: 8815541 Document Number: 455470
Microbiologists have traditionally focused on free-floating bacteria growing in laboratory cultures but are now recognizing that most bacteria aggregate as biofilms, a form in which they behave very differently. By 1990, it was confirmed that biofilm bacteria are morphologically and metabolically different from free-floating ones and that any bacterium can form a biofilm, as long as it finds a place to stick. It is the stickiness of biofilms that creates problems for industry in everything from corroding water pipes to computer-chip malfunctions, and researchers are also increasingly aware of the devastating effects biofilms can have on people; biofilms resist antibiotics and are also big enough to defeat the immune system. The efforts of researchers to find creative ways to conquer biofilms, from new antibiotics to jolts of electric current, and to find new uses for beneficial biofilms are discussed.