Antibacterial effect of nanoparticles

Over the last century, antibiotics against bacterial infections have led
to increased life expectancy and quality of people worldwide. Yet the
WHO has brought attention to the increasing resistance development
of bacterial pathogens against antibiotics - many bacteria are already
multi-resistant. In the search for alternatives to classical antibiotics,
nanotechnology and nanoparticles (NP) are moving into the focus of
scientific research. Particular attention is paid to the Nano-silver (Ag-
NP), which has experienced an immense upswing in recent years and is
used in many medical products such as wound dressings or consumer
products. However, are Ag-NPs safe for health and the environment? To
tackle this challenge, conventional methods have been used to explore
nanoparticle resistance. Conversely, these methods have proven to be
limited in terms of labor, cost, and statistical power. In our work,
we intend to overcome these barriers by developing a droplet-based
microfluidic analytical platform as a tool to elucidate the impact and
biological influence of nanoparticles on living microorganisms with high
statistical evaluation and detection efficiency. This method allows the
separation of bacteria into single droplets, the generation of individual
bioreactors, and the screening of bacterial metabolism in the
presence of Ag-NP.