Dr. Robert Martinuzzi, left, and Dr. Victoria Kostenko of the University of Calgary's Biofilm Engineering Research Group.Chris Bolin
When the American Society for Microbiology recently announced that researchers at the University of Calgary had identified a better way to treat infected wounds, the news had a fascinating twist.
The same team of scientists discovering how to best combat deadly biofilms, the colonies of bacteria that can thrive in chronic wounds, was also working on encouraging biofilms to help clean up the toxic slurry left behind by oil sands extraction.
Indeed, the wound-care investigation was reported in the December 2010 issue of the journal Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy to have grown "out of the researchers' efforts to develop bioremediation for oil sands tailing ponds, such as those in northern Alberta."
An accidental discovery? Scientific serendipity? No, say members of the U of C's Biofilm Engineering Research Group. This is the way research at the university level is supposed to work, with diverse applications stemming from pure science from academics in a wide range of disciplines.
Made up of biologists and mechanical and chemical engineers, the group's work on the science of controlling and exploiting biofilms has applications in a wide range of areas, even extending beyond the medical and environmental fields to uses such as stopping corrosion in metals, improving fermentation processes and enriching agricultural soils.
"Good science requires us to interconnect things that normally would not interconnect," says Dr. Robert Martinuzzi, a fluid mechanics engineer at the university's Schulich School of Engineering. "It's really pretty exciting."
Dr. Martinuzzi worked with Dr. Victoria Kostenko, a microbiologist also of the Schulich School, on the wounds study, looking at the best way to treat infection using dressings containing silver preparations.
They found that smaller "nanocrystaline" particles of silver were more effective at breaking down the biofilms' defences against antibiotics in order to treat wound infections.
Dr. Kostenko says that working as a biologist with engineers on such issues is interesting.
"Having specialists in two such different fields at the same table allows us to discuss this issue from different points of view."
Biofilms research looks at everything from the genetic and physiological to the biological and chemical properties of these microorganisms, she says.
Biofilms differ from "free-floating" bacteria, she says, because they essentially live in a community, mounting common defences against predators, communicating by chemical signals and interacting in unique ways. "We can control and reduce the viability of biofilms in medical situations," she says, while at the same time it is possible to control biofilm signalling systems to enhance the production and effectiveness of beneficial biofilms.
The biofilms used to reduce the toxicity of tailings ponds are a different class of microorganisms, nitrate-reducing bacteria, which can act as solvents, separating clay, organic matter, hydrocarbons and trace metals from the water in which they are suspended. Settling out the tailings would make more water available for recycling and even reduce the toxicity of the ponds themselves.
Dr. Martinuzzi says it is helpful to bring together engineers and biologists because they approach equations and experiments from different ends of the spectrum, putting together ideas and concepts that otherwise wouldn't be together.
"The focus is on the basic science that drives those different processes, and now you're seeing the transfer of that science to different applications."
Dr. Naweed Syed, a neuroscientist who is a special adviser on biomedical engineering at U of C, says that interdisciplinary research means a "bench-to-bed-to-marketing" approach.
"We have to be innovation-savvy, or we'll become extinct like Albertasaurus," he says, adding that the approach can be difficult for many researchers.
"Scientists are tunnel-diggers, we all live in our unique worlds," he says. "If we want to solve complex problems, we need to get these groups of people to get out of their silos and to work together."
Biomedical engineering, with a mix of disciplines from medicine and engineering to kinesiology and chemistry, is a key priority at the university, he says, with applications from the oil-and-gas industry to public health.
Partnerships with post-secondary institutions benefit industry, Dr. Syed adds, which shies away from research and development, with its expense and the complexity of clinical trials.
Special to The Globe and Mail