Assessment of the performance of nonfouling polymer hydrogels utilizing citizen scientists

Abstract

To facilitate longer duration space travel, flight crew sickness and disease transmission amongst the crew must be eliminated. High contact surfaces within space vehicles provide an opportunity for bacterial adhesion, which can lead to biofilm formation or disease transmission. This study evaluates the performance of several nonfouling polymers using citizen science, to identify the best performing chemistry for future applications as bacteria resistant coatings. The specific polymer chemistries tested were zwitterionic sulfobetaine methacrylate (SBMA), and polyampholytes composed of [2-(acryloyloxy)ethyl] trimethylammonium chloride and 2-carboxyethyl acrylate (TMA/CAA), or TMA and 3-sulfopropyl methacrylate (TMA/SA). Each polymer chemistry is known to exhibit bacteria resistance, and this study provides a direct side-by-side comparison between the chemistries using a citizen science approach. Nearly 100 citizen scientists returned results comparing the performance of these polymers over repeat exposure to bacteria and 30 total days of growth. The results demonstrate that TMA/CAA polyampholyte hydrogels show the best long-term resistance to bacteria adhesion.

Forming bonds between molecules and communities through Project M

“…Citizen science in the classroom creates practical opportunities to engage the youth in scientific enquiry (Makuch and Aczel, 2018), to improve their scientific literacy and science capital (Bonn et al, 2018) and to give them agency in their education (Ballard et al, 2017). Examples specifically for chemistry citizen science in the secondary/high school domain include monitoring the physiochemical parameters of coastal water quality (Araújo et al, 2022b), evaluating global medicine quality (Bliese et al, 2020), recording radon tests in their homes (Tsapalov et al, 2020), and comparing the bacteria resistant performance of nonfouling polymer hydrogels (Hansen et al, 2022). Teachers have also perceived added value for their own chemistry teaching practices through the use of citizen science (Araújo et al, 2022a).…”