On-demand Contact Based Antimicrobial Surfaces: Human and Environmental Safe Infection Control Strategy

In nowadays very fast living society protecting surfaces from accumulation and transmission of health –threating pathogens is of the highest propriety for public health. Effective and save pathogen control is needed not only in medical sector (including hospitals, medical procedures, medical tools, devices and implants), but also in general public (frequently used surfaces and personal protecting equipment), and food sector (i.e. food packaging and water supply). Decades of research in antimicrobial protection resulted in a large number of infection control strategies. Mostly they are focused on releasing or producing active components that kill / deactivate pathogens or repel them and prevent their adhesion to the surface. In both cases there is a large risk from pathogen survival (either because of time-developed decrease in efficacy in releasing technologies or in repelled- pathogen induced contamination) which brought our society to enormous problem of antimicrobial resistance and global lack of effective antimicrobial agents, particularly antibiotics. On the other hand, strategies highly efficient against pathogens are also extremely toxic for human and environment. These facts point toward urgent need for a novel way of thinking in designing pathogen protection which will bring a balance between meeting criteria of efficacy against wide range of pathogens, on one hand, and meeting criteria for ecosafety, recyclability and biodegradability, on other hand, in order to bring a real, short- and long- term benefits to public health. Within current project we aim out-of-box design of pathogen protection and systematic evaluation of its applicability, benefits and risks in health protection. For that purpose we will implement novel generation, on-demand contact-based antimicrobial surface technology which is nanoparticle-free, does not release or produce any active component and possesses ability to be activated upon contamination. The approach is based on engineering the surface of organic piezoelectric to promote pathogen adhesion after surface contamination which will trigger piezoelectric stimuli and use them for complete physical pathogen deactivation / disintegration. Particularly we will evaluate the applicability of the technology in providing strong bactericidal action against wide range of clinically relevant Gram positive and Gram negative bacterial strains, present as sessile bacteria or as bacteria within biofilms, isolated from infected soft tissue and surface of medical implants, as well as (multi)resistant bacterial strains. The same technology will be also evaluated for antiviral activity and possibility for complete inactivation of a wide range of virus models characterized by presence or absence of outer envelope. In the final stage, the technology will be evaluated for biodegradability, long –term pathogen- control stability and toxicity in order to assess its compatibility to human and environment. These complex and very ambitious tasks will be implemented by joining the extensive experience of biomaterials team at Advanced Materials Department, Jozef Stefan Institute (JSI) in designing contact-based antimicrobials, expertise of National Laboratory for Health, Food and Environment (NLZOH) in assessing bacterial susceptibility and resistance, experience of National Institute of Biology (NIB) in assessing antiviral activity (particularly in non-conventional technologies) and expertise of Department for Biotechnology at JSI in assessing toxicity and human cell death. Within the project we will generate a new knowledge on risks and benefits of novel approach in designing infection control for public health including both capacity for pathogen control and safety for human and environment.