Center for Biofilm Engineering

Research News

07/18/2008

MSU Researcher Uses Grant to Study Little-Known but Largely Useful Microbes

Montana State University microbiologist Matthew Fields spends his days trying to understand how interactions on a microscopic scale could change how we think of energy production, climate change and even soil contamination.
    Fields studies the physiology and behavior of microbes - the tiny organisms that have inhabited virtually every square inch of the earth's surface for the past 3.5 billion years.
    "Microbes have global impacts," Fields said. "They can grow fast and in large numbers, and there is always power in numbers."
    Fields is particularly interested in how that power can be harnessed for human use. Last year, he received a five-year $1.65 million grant from the Department of Energy to study how microbes living together interact.

Read the full story "MSU Researcher"

Fall 2007

We Can Heal That

MSU's biofilm research helps a Texas physician revolutionize the treatment of chronic wounds

    Dr. Randy Wolcott walks into a small exam room. Seated before him is an elderly, balding man with an open wound on his right foot.
    "Please don't cut anything off," the man says the moment Wolcott enters, fear and desperation in his voice.
    The patient's right foot is chapped to flaking. Near the little toe, is a vivid red wound. He winces as Wolcott examines it. Like most of the patients who visit the Southwest Regional Wound Care Center in Lubbock, Texas, the man is diabetic.

Read the full story "We Can Heal That"

09/05/2007

Committee on Pesticides Approves Second Biofilm Standard

Biofilm, a type of bacteria that forms self-organized communities and can have both positive and negative effects in a variety of industries, is the subject of a new ASTM standard developed by Committee E35 on Pesticides and Alternative Control Agents. The uses and effects of biofilm are currently being studied by industrial, medical, professional and regulatory agencies. The new test method, E 2562, is one of only two standards that address how to grow, sample and analyze biofilm bacteria.

Read the full text "Committee on Pesticides Approves Second Biofilm Standard"

07/25/2007

Battling Biofilms Brings Together Academics and Industry at Conference

Researchers, doctors and business people from across the United States and the United Kingdom are in Bozeman this week discussing how to battle sticky masses of bacteria known as biofilms at what may be the largest industrial conference on the subject anywhere.

Read the full text "Battling Biofilms Brings Together Academics and Industry at Conference"

02/27/2007

Magnetic Resonance Microscopy Research Lands Professor an NSF Award

Sarah Codd, a Montana State University professor has won a prestigious $400,000 Career Award from the National Science Foundation for her work in magnetic resonance microscopy, a technique that allows researchers to see the inner workings of devices as small as one-tenth of a millimeter in size.

Read the full text "Magnetic Resonance Microscopy Research Lands Professor NSF Award"

10/06/2006

Research into Herpes Vaccine Among Seven New Biotechnologies Available for Licensing

A genetically modified strain of the herpes virus with potential as a human vaccine is among seven new biotechnologies faculty at Montana State University have developed.

Interested companies and entrepreneurs can license the new biotechnologies by contacting Nick Zelver with the MSU Technology Transfer Office at (406) 994-7868, http://tto.montana.edu or by e-mail at nzelver@montana.edu. MSU requests that interest be expressed in writing by Nov. 15.

Read the full text "Research into Herpes Vaccine Among Seven New Biotechnologies Available for Licensing"

09/10/2006

'Crabby' Compound that Skewers Bacteria Could Prevent Medical Implant Infections

A chemical compound found in crabs and shrimp that has long been known to have certain medicinal value also can act like a "bed of nails," fending off microbes seeking to colonize wound dressings, catheters and other implantable medical devices, according to Montana State University researchers. Using the compound to coat these medical devices, they say, could help prevent thousands of bacterial and yeast infections annually.
 

Read the full text 'Crabby' Compound that Skewers Bacteria Could Prevent Medical Implant Infections

07/19/2006

MSU Wins Millions to Find Treatments for Slow-Healing Wounds 

The National Institutes of Health has awarded Montana State University's Center for Biofilm Engineering a $2.9 million grant to find new ways to heal chronic wounds.
 

Read the full text "MSU wins millions to find treatments for slow-healing wounds"

07/11/2006

MSU Offers Four New Technologies for Licensing to Entrepreneurs 

A way to precisely place an electrode in the brain, a microscope small enough to fit inside a needle and a way to distinguish live from dead bacterial cells are among four new technologies developed by faculty at Montana State University.

The technologies are available for licensing by interested companies and entrepreneurs.

Read the full text "MSU offers four new technologies for licensing to entrepreneurs"

5/15/2006

MSU Grad's Research Takes Him to Nation's Capital 

A recent Montana State University graduate's innovative research into a treatment for groundwater contaminants was presented on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., in late April.

Read the full text "MSU grad's research takes him to nation's capital "

01/26/2006

CBE Team Designs and Tests Microbial Fuel Cells

Imagine if you could drop a sensor in a stream, collect data from it and transfer the data via satellite connection to your laboratory for 10 years without returning to the site. Zbigniew Lewandowski, a civil engineer specializing in environmental engineering, and Haluk Beyenal, a chemical engineer, oversee a multidisciplinary team working to make this possible.

Read the full text "CBE Team Designs and Tests Microbial Fuel Cells"

11/29/2005

Slimy Bacteria Leads to List of Discoveries

Call it a social experiment, if you will, but bacteria like to live communally. They grab onto a surface and build an entire neighborhood. They cover themselves with a protective slime, called biofilm, that acts like a force field. Bacteria-killing antibiotics can't get through.

Read the full text "Slimy Bacteria Leads to List of Discoveries"

06/2005

Medical Biofilm Laboratory is Making a Difference

The CBE’s Medical Biofilm Laboratory has been creating news because its work is leading to different treatments for patients at the Southwest Regional Wound Care Center in Lubbock, Texas, which treats up to 100 patients a day. CBE undergraduate, Ellen Swogger, has been featured for her contribution to this research in a recent MSU news story.

See the full story “Student-doctor Team Wages War on Wounds”

06/2005

2004–05 Annual Report

We are delighted to share this past year’s activities with you through our annual report, which documents our accomplishments in postcard pictures and text. You can find downloadable pdf versions of the full-color report with photos and the text-only format on the CBE home page: http://www.biofilm.montana.edu

04/2004

Molasses and Whey Mix with Mine Tailings

In Montana, about 20,000 abandoned mine sites leach acids into waterways, damaging an estimated 1,000 miles of streams. Researchers from Montana State University have set out to lessen the toxic effects of mine waste -- using cheese whey and molasses.

Paul Sturman, an engineer with MSU's Center for Biofilm Engineering, has collected toxic mine waste from four sites: the Golden Sunlight Mine near Whitehall, the Mammoth Mine in the northern Tobacco Root Mountains and two sites in Canada. With a $50,000 grant from the Environmental Protection Agency and a subcontract from MSE Technology Applications of Butte, Sturman will spend the next two years testing tailings.

See full press release and contact info.

02/2004

A Digest:  ASM Biofilms 2003 Themes

    The American Society for Microbiology meeting “Biofilms 2003,” held in Victoria, British Columbia in early November 2003, was the largest biofilm meeting ever held. Seventy-six oral presentations and 369 posters were presented over five days. This selective summary of the meeting (which is derived from a presentation made at the Center for Biofilm Engineering Technical Advisory Conference on February 5, 2004), focuses on five themes that especially stood out: 1) the expanding world of biofilm research and technology, 2) advances in characterizing microbial ecology in biofilms, 3) the occurrence of phenotypic variants in biofilms, 4) dispersal (detachment) from biofilms, and 5) interactions between microbial biofilms and higher organisms.

More about each theme.  Image, contact information,  and researcher names included.

11/2003

Biofilm Antibiotic Resistance

A Genetic Basis for Pseudomonas aeruginosa Biofilm Antibiotic Resistance
Mah T-F, Pitts B, Pellock B, Walker GC, Stewart PS, OToole GA
Nature Nov 2003; 426(6964):306-310

See press releases at:

http://www.biofilm.montana.edu/Res-Lib99-SW/newsarchives/html/2003/Nature_News.htm

http://www.biofilmsonline.com/cgi-bin/biofilmsonline/00194

GLUCANS mediate biofilm resistance
Biomedcentral.com, UK
http://www.biomedcentral.com/news/20031120/02/

NATURE Press Release for 20 November Issue
Newswise (press release)
Medicine: Biofilm barrier (pp306-310)
http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/502055/

Biofilm Antibiotic Resistance May Be Susceptible to Genetic Approach
Public Release Date: 19 NOVEMBER 2003
Contact: Andy Nordhoff
DMS.Communications@Dartmouth.edu
603-650-1492
Dartmouth Medical School
http://www.biofilmsonline.com/cgi-bin/biofilmsonline/00194

 
MSU slimy bacteria study appears in major journal
November 19, 2003 -- by Annette Trinity-Stevens, MSU research editor
http://www.montana.edu/commserv/csnews/nwview.php?article=1389
 

Contact: Dr. Phil Stewart, phil_s@erc.montana.edu, 406 994-2890

Multicellular Strategies

An interactive web interface survey of biofilm microbial activities and CBE research.  See http://www.biofilm.montana.edu/MultiCellStrat/default.html

CBE Publications

Publications are in a searchable database, by year, title, author, or topic area.