Publications Repository - Gdańsk University of Technology

Understanding bacterial deactivation at the micro-scale, particularly with E. coli, is crucial for advancing microbiology and has promising applications in biomedical research. In this research contribution, we investigate the thermal inactivation of E. coli bacteria using gold nanoparticles irradiated by a green 1-W laser within a microfluidic chamber. The microfluidic device comprises a fluidic chamber filled with a thin film of water and air (1 mm thick). The chamber is constructed with 1 mm PDMS coating on the top and side walls, and 1 mm borosilicate glass on the bottom. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) calculations are executed using ANSYS Fluent software employing the Volume of Fluid (VOF) multi-phase model. Bacterial deactivation is described by a first-order kinetic model, while the Arrhenius equation is employed to define the decay coefficient. The light-heat conversion is modeled using a literature-based approach, validated against experimental data. Our findings affirm the efficacy of the proposed physical model (laser + gold nanoparticles) for bacterial inactivation. Additionally, we propose an innovative approach by coupling bacterial inactivation equations and VOF model, opening avenues for further applications in the field.

Authors

• dr Aimad Koulali link open in new tab ,
• mgr inż. Piotr Radomski link open in new tab ,
• L. De Sio,
• prof. dr hab. inż. Dariusz Mikielewicz link open in new tab ,
• dr inż. Paweł Ziółkowski link open in new tab