Biomedical photonics applied towards noninvasive imaging of bacterial biofilms
This project is part of the Marie Curie ITN project “CycloN Hit” aimed at developing nanocarriers for the delivery of antimicrobial agents to fight resistance mechanisms. Our long term goal in this project is to investigate mechanisms of antimicrobial resistance and evaluate efficacy of emerging delivery agents using noninvasive advanced imaging techniques
Participants: Hanna Thomsen, Marica B. Ericson (Biomedical Photonics, Dept of Chemistry and Molecular Biology, GU) and Anne Farewell, Microbiology, Dept of Chemistry and Molecular Biology, GU, and CARe
Present funding: Swedish Research Council (VR, 2015-05002, 3 250 kSEK), 2016 – 2019, Carl Tryggers Stiftelse, 280 kSEK, 2017-2018, FP7-ITN-Marie Curie project (CyclonHIT, N°608407, Coordinator: R.Gref, Paris; UGOT: 2 400 kSEK), 2014- 2018, Swedish government, ALF-grant (ALFGBG-528001, 625 kSEK), Coordinator: A-M. Wennberg, Dept. Dermatology, GU, 2016-2017.
Correspondence: hanna.thomsen@chem.gu.se or marica.ericson@chem.gu.se
Bacterial biofilms show increased tolerance to antibiotics compared to planktonic bacteria and are recognized as a significant cause of chronic infection. In this project, multiphoton microscopy (MPM) is explored as a noninvasive technique for imaging complex, mature microbial biofilms in 3D to study the structures and environment contributing to antibiotic resistance of biofilms. A biofilm model of staphylococcus epidermidis, prevalent in infections of implanted medical devices, has been developed for direct noninvasive imaging of live biofilms in an experimental MPM setup. MPM allows for penetration depth and inherent optical sectioning of the biofilms up to 150μm in depth; imaged in high resolution throughout 3D structure. This experimental setup has been used to investigate biofilm adherence and growth in addition to penetration depth and bio-distribution of particles within biofilm structure. Further studies are focused on quantifying diffusion of particles in this biofilm model using MPM combined with fluorescence correlation spectroscopy. This project is part of the Marie Curie ITN project “CycloN Hit” aimed at developing nanocarriers for the delivery of antimicrobial agents to fight resistance mechanisms. Our long term goal in this project is to investigate mechanisms of antimicrobial resistance and evaluate efficacy of emerging delivery agents using noninvasive advanced imaging techniques