ERI: Towards Engineered LiVIng metaSurfaces (ELVIS)- Understanding and Modeling Biofilm Growth on a Heterogeneous Surface for Environmentally Benign Biofouling Mitigation

Unwanted attachment and growth of living organisms on surfaces in contact with water cause costly problems in shipping, farming, energy production, and health care. This growth can clog equipment, reduce efficiency, increase maintenance costs, and shorten the lifetimes of important systems. Many current methods to control this growth rely on chemicals that can harm the environment. This project will study a new approach that uses tiny organisms to create small, pillar-like features on a surface. Special surface patterns will guide where these organisms attach, grow, and form pillars. These features are expected to make it harder for larger unwanted organisms to settle on the surface and grow. Laboratory tests and computer studies will be used to better understand how the living structures form and how they can be designed for specific applications. The research could lead to longer-lasting surfaces, lower maintenance costs, improved performance, and more environmentally friendly technologies. The project will train undergraduate and graduate students in research methods and develop new course materials. The project will engage K-12 students in outreach activities, create publicly available educational resources, and share research results with the broader community. Biofouling, the unwanted accumulation of microorganisms on surfaces exposed to water, adversely affects transportation, agriculture, energy systems, and biomedical devices. This project will develop an engineered living meta-surface that leverages preferential microbial attachment and biofilm growth on patterned two-dimensional surfaces composed of graphene and hexagonal boron nitride. The approach exploits differences in surface properties to guide microbial growth into predefined regions, enabling the formation of three-dimensional living microstructures. These living microstructures are hypothesized to function as a biologically derived antifouling surface that inhibits the attachment and growth of larger fouling organisms. Laboratory experiments will investigate how surface pattern geometry and fluid shear influence microbial attachment, biofilm development, surface morphology, and effective wettability. Surface characterization will quantify the size, shape, spacing, and growth dynamics of the resulting microstructures. Complementary computational studies will integrate computational fluid dynamics simulations with stochastic microbial transport and continuum population models to predict microbial distributions near heterogeneous surfaces and identify the mechanisms responsible for preferential attachment. The combined experimental and computational framework will establish fundamental design principles for engineered living antifouling materials and provide predictive capability to control biofilm organization through surface patterning and fluid flow. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria. NSF Award ID: 2553511 | Program: 01002627DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT | Principal Investigator: Joseph Thalakkottor | Institution: South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, RAPID CITY, SD | Award Amount: $199,994 View on NSF Award Search: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/show-award/?AWD_ID=2553511 View on Research.gov: https://www.research.gov/awardapi-service/v1/awards/2553511.html