Bacterial adhesion to curved surfaces in fluid flow

Abstract

Minimising bacterial surface adhesion and subsequent biofilm formation in industrial and medical settings requires understanding how bacteria are transported and adhere to complex surface geometries in the presence of non-uniform flow. In this paper, we consider the transport of a dilute suspension of motile bacteria through a corrugated two-dimensional channel with perfectly adhesive walls. Considering flows much faster than the bacterial swimming speed, we asymptotically analyse the diffusive boundary layer that forms using a curvilinear coordinate system based on the fluid streamfunction. We present a similarity solution to the diffusivity-varying diffusion-type equation that arises, from which we derive an analytical expression for the bacterial adhesion rate as a function of surface arclength and the spatially varying wall shear rate. Our model predicts that bacterial adhesion becomes localised on curved surfaces, with bacteria showing preferential adhesion to wall ‘peaks’ at lower shear rates and preferential adhesion to wall ‘valleys’ at higher shear rates. More broadly, our results highlight how spatially varying flows generated by complex geometries can lead to localised bacterial adhesion, with potential implications for both enhancing and minimising biofilm formation.