Poster

Thermodynamic Inhibition in a Biofilm Reactor with Suspended Bacteria

eSMB2020 eSMB2020 Follow 2:30 - 3:30pm EDT, Monday - Wednesday
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Jack M Hughes

"Thermodynamic Inhibition in a Biofilm Reactor with Suspended Bacteria"
We formulate a biofilm reactor model with suspended bacteria that accounts for thermodynamic growth inhibition. The reactor model is a chemostat style model consisting of a single replenished growth promoting substrate, a single reaction product, suspended bacteria, and wall attached bacteria in the form of a bacterial biofilm. We present stability results for the washout equilibrium and conduct a computational study. While stability conditions are similar to a chemostat model, we find that the steady-state concentration of the replenished substrate depends on its inflow concentration. In the computational study, we find that thermodynamic inhibition limits substrate utilization/ production both inside the biofilm and inside the aqueous phase, resulting in less suspended bacteria and a thinner biofilm.
eSMB2020
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Virtual conference of the Society for Mathematical Biology, 2020.