A comparative study for the inactivation of multidrug resistance bacteria using dielectric barrier discharge and nano-second pulsed plasma

Abstract

Bacteria can be inactivated through various physical and chemical means, and these have always been the focus of extensive research. To further improve the methodology for these ends, two types of plasma systems were investigated: nano-second pulsed plasma (NPP) as liquid discharge plasma and an Argon gas-feeding dielectric barrier discharge (Ar-DBD) as a form of surface plasma. To understand the sterilizing action of these two different plasma sources, we performed experiments with Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) bacteria (wild type) and multidrug resistant bacteria (Penicillum-resistant, Methicillin-resistant and Gentamicin-resistant). We observed that both plasma sources can inactivate both the wild type and multidrug-resistant bacteria to a good extent. Moreover, we observed a change in the surface morphology, gene expression and β-lactamase activity. Furthermore, we used X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy to investigate the variation in functional groups (C-H/C-C, C-OH and C=O) of the peptidoglycan (PG) resulting from exposure to plasma species. To obtain atomic scale insight in the plasma-cell interactions and support our experimental observations, we have performed molecular dynamics simulations to study the effects of plasma species, such as OH, H2O2, O, O3, as well as O2 and H2O, on the dissociation/formation of above mentioned functional groups in PG.

Variation in structure of proteins by adjusting reactive oxygen and nitrogen species generated from dielectric barrier discharge jet

“…First, we observed the OH radicals and found that after 4 min treatment in the Ar and Ar-O 2 plasma, the fluorescence intensity generated due to the reaction of terephthalic acid (TA) with OH (as described in our earlier work)31516, decreases with the addition of O 2 content. Similarly, for Ar-N 2 , the intensity decreases with the addition of N 2 content from 0.2% to 0.4%.…”

“…The H 2 O 2 was measured using titanyl ion, and NO was detected using 4-amino-5-methylamino-2′,7′-difluorofluo rescein (DAF-FM)36. OH was measured using terephthalic acid (20 mM), as per the procedure given in the earlier research work31136. NO 2 − was measured using the Griess reagent supplied by Aldrich Chemical Co. (USA)36.…”

“…It has been demonstrated that CAP can efficiently inactivate multidrug resistant microorganisms1234. CAP is therefore extremely appropriate for the sterilization of immobilized microorganisms on a material surface under dry and wet conditions, as well as for a wide variety of other practical applications5678.…”

The protective action of osmolytes on the deleterious effects of gamma rays and atmospheric pressure plasma on protein conformational changes

“…Plasma medicine is a new field that uses NTP plasma for a diversity of medical applications 10 – 12 , such as sterilization 12 , wound healing 13 , blood coagulation 14 , 15 , and cancer treatment 16 . NTP plasma interacts with the oxygen, nitrogen, water, etc.…”

Potential Applications of Non-thermal Plasma in Animal Husbandry to Improve Infrastructure

“…The antibacterial efficacy of NTP has been further confirmed by several groups (4,30,(38)(39)(40). NTP has been found to have antibacterial effects on a variety of bacteria (41,42), on ESKAPE pathogens in the environment (17), on multi-drugresistant bacteria in surface environments (43). Moreover, NTP has been shown to suppress host-cell invasion and to deactivate cell motility of Salmonella Typhimurium (44).…”