On a constitutive model for microbial biofilms based on polymer mechanics

Dr. Alexander Ehret (University of Glasgow)

Thursday 28th February, 2013 14:00-15:00 Maths 203

Abstract

Microbial cells embedded in a matrix of extracellular polymeric 
substances (EPS) and attached to surfaces are commonly referred to as 
biofilms. Owing to the important role they take in ecology, health and 
industrial processes, biofilm research has gained large interest during 
the last decades. In the present contribution, we focus on the 
mechanical properties of biofilm, whose EPS is treated as a gel-forming 
polysaccharide network. By this means, classical theories of polymer 
mechanics can be considered and customised to explain the non-linear 
viscoelastic characteristics observed in experiments.

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