Antimicrobial surfaces prevent the growth and spread of infectious microbes on a plethora of materials of human use. They have become both ubiquitous and indispensable in extending the shelf-life of consumer and industrial goods and in reducing health risks across a wide range of sectors such as food packaging, furniture, textiles, the building and shipping or the health industries. At present, there is a growing interest in designing antimicrobial surfaces from (nano)cellulose, a biopolymer that combines sustainability with outstanding mechanical properties and economic production. There is also the need to find suitable replacements for antimicrobial silver-based agents due to environmental toxicity and spread of resistance to metal antimicrobials. This presentation will detail our efforts in the development of antimicrobial nanocellulose films by direct functionalization of the surface with small abietanes. This conceptually unique design afforded non-leaching anionic surfaces which we have shown to reduce the number of viable staphylococci in suspension, including drug-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, by 4−5 log units, upon contact. Our abietane-modified nanocellulose films resisted colonization by bacteria in an artificial dermis model mimicking the environment found in wounds, an outstanding feature needed for the design of indwelling medical devices. The activity of the films was not hampered by high protein content and fibroblasts grew well at their surface. No significant hemolysis levels were detected on human erythrocytes. With this approach, we have challenged the conventional use of silver and cationic compounds as antimicrobials (and usually leaching) agents, found in a plethora of literature reports. We have used fully renewable raw materials from nature, namely nanocelluose and the abietanes, to create surfaces with indisputable antimicrobial activity demonstrated using state-of-the-art models that best depict an “in vivo scenario”.

Abietane-based nanocellulose films: Fully sustainable, anionic, biocompatible and non-leaching surfaces to efficiently prevent bacterial fouling

ACS Spring Meeting 2021

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