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Thermal Effects on Surface Structures and Properties of Bacillus anthracis Spores on Nanometer Scales

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Department of Engineering Physics, Air Force Institute of Technology, 2950 Hobson Way, Wright-Patterson AFB Ohio 45433-7765, United States
Cite this: Langmuir 2013, 29, 26, 8343–8354
Publication Date (Web):June 6, 2013
https://doi.org/10.1021/la400992q
Copyright © 2013 American Chemical Society
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Abstract

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Bacterial spores, one of the hardiest forms of life known, can survive severe environmental stresses such as high temperature. Using thermal atomic force microscopy (AFM), we show that the surface structures and properties of Bacillus anthracis spores when exposed to elevated temperatures undergo substantial changes on nanometer scales. Thermal-blister-like nanostructures, which grow in size with increasing temperature, are formed on the spore surface when it is heated by a thermal tip. Although thermal damage to the spore surface is persistent upon cooling heat-treated spores to room temperature, thermal effects on surface properties of the spores are complex. The thermally induced nanostructures show a lower surface–tip adhesion and a higher modulus than the surrounding spore surface. The overall trend is for the adhesion to decrease with increasing temperature. However, the adhesion of heat-treated spores may be smaller than, equal to, or larger than that of untreated spores, depending upon the degree of surface damage induced by heat. Although the overall spore dimensions show few changes during and after heat treatment, the size of the spore substructures decreases significantly. In addition, we demonstrate a nanoscratch AFM method for imaging the subsurface structures of spores.

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AFM images of Bacillus anthracis spores. This material is available free of charge via the Internet at http://pubs.acs.org.

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Cited By


This article is cited by 3 publications.

  1. Alex G. Li, Larry W. Burggraf, Yun Xing, . Nanomechanical Characterization of Bacillus anthracis Spores by Atomic Force Microscopy. Applied and Environmental Microbiology 2016, 82 (10) , 2988-2999. https://doi.org/10.1128/AEM.00431-16
  2. W. Zhou, M.W. Orr, G. Jian, S.K. Watt, V.T. Lee, M.R. Zachariah. Inactivation of bacterial spores subjected to sub-second thermal stress. Chemical Engineering Journal 2015, 279 , 578-588. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cej.2015.05.021
  3. Yun Xing, Alex Li, Daniel L. Felker, Larry W. Burggraf. Nanoscale Structural and Mechanical Analysis of Bacillus anthracis Spores Inactivated with Rapid Dry Heating. Applied and Environmental Microbiology 2014, 80 (5) , 1739-1749. https://doi.org/10.1128/AEM.03483-13

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