Advancing Coatings with Biotechnology

A special issue of Coatings (ISSN 2079-6412).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 September 2015) | Viewed by 16635

Special Issue Editor

1 Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 7905, Raleigh, NC 27695-7905, USA
2 Golden LEAF Biomanufacturing Training & Education Center, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 7928, Raleigh, NC 27695-7928, USA
Interests: Bioprocess Intensification and Miniaturization (BIM); bioreactive materials; biocatalytic coatings; biopreservation; nano-structured biocatalytic coatings and microbial inks; microbial biocatalyst engineering; biocoating reactor engineering
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Biotechnology has revolutionized many industries.  It will dramatically impact the coating industry as well by creating biocoatings with functionality far beyond today’s polymer coatings. A special issue of Coatings combining biotechnology and coatings has never before been published. This issue will highlight advances in colloid and polymer materials, enzyme and microbial biotechnology that will dramatically transform the functionality of waterborne coatings using the selectivity and reactivity of biology.  Biocoatings have been demonstrated in laboratory studies that preserve and stabilize the reactivity of enzymes, biomolecules (pigments, nucleic acids, proteins) or reactive microbes (bacteria, yeast, fungi, archea, algae) for hundreds to thousands of hours. Biocoatings can react to chemicals in the environment and degrade toxins; others are photoreactive producing or consuming gasses using solar energy.  Some can be used as biocatalysts for chiral chemical transformations in aqueous or multi-phase systems, while others sense their environment (color change, luminesce, fluoresce) or self-tune to incident light intensity.  There is a very significant gap between these academic demonstrations and the information needed for development of commercial biocoatings.  Methods are needed for waterborne biocoating formulation, drying/curing without inactivation, wet adhesion, and optimization of nanoporosity.  Modeling of the porosity, stability and reactivity of single or multi-component biocoatings is lacking.  Close collaboration is needed between academic and industrial developers in the next 5 to 10 years to establish standards for measuring coating safety and stability for biocoatings to become commercial products proven in the market.  This issue will highlight both the advances and the many challenges for commercial development of coatings utilizing biotechnology.  Please contact me if you wish to discuss your contribution to this first special issue on Advancing Coatings with Biotechnology.

Prof. Dr. Michael C. Flickinger
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Coatings is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • reactive enzyme coatings
  • biocatalytic coatings
  • photoreactive biocoatings
  • biocatalytic plastics
  • waterborne biocoatings
  • smart coatings using biotechnology
  • bioreactive polymer coatings

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

717 KiB  
Article
Ink-Jet Printing of Gluconobacter oxydans: Micropatterned Coatings As High Surface-to-Volume Ratio Bio-Reactive Coatings
by Marcello Fidaleo, Nadia Bortone, Mark Schulte and Michael C. Flickinger
Coatings 2014, 4(1), 1-17; https://doi.org/10.3390/coatings4010001 - 19 Dec 2013
Cited by 10 | Viewed by 7063
Abstract
We formulated a latex ink for ink-jet deposition of viable Gram-negative bacterium Gluconobacter oxydans as a model adhesive, thin, highly bio-reactive microstructured microbial coating. Control of G. oxydans latex-based ink viscosity by dilution with water allowed ink-jet piezoelectric droplet deposition of 30 × [...] Read more.
We formulated a latex ink for ink-jet deposition of viable Gram-negative bacterium Gluconobacter oxydans as a model adhesive, thin, highly bio-reactive microstructured microbial coating. Control of G. oxydans latex-based ink viscosity by dilution with water allowed ink-jet piezoelectric droplet deposition of 30 × 30 arrays of two or three droplets/dot microstructures on a polyester substrate. Profilometry analysis was used to study the resulting dry microstructures. Arrays of individual dots with base diameters of ~233–241 µm were obtained. Ring-shaped dots with dot edges higher than the center, 2.2 and 0.9 µm respectively, were obtained when a one-to-four diluted ink was used. With a less diluted ink (one-to-two diluted), the microstructure became more uniform with an average height of 3.0 µm, but the ink-jet printability was more difficult. Reactivity of the ink-jet deposited microstructures following drying and rehydration was studied in a non-growth medium by oxidation of 50 g/L D-sorbitol to L-sorbose, and a high dot volumetric reaction rate was measured (~435 g·L−1·h−1). These results indicate that latex ink microstructures generated by ink-jet printing may hold considerable potential for 3D fabrication of high surface-to-volume ratio biocoatings for use as microbial biosensors with the aim of coating microbes as reactive biosensors on electronic devices and circuit chips. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advancing Coatings with Biotechnology)
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4373 KiB  
Article
Continuous Convective-Sedimentation Assembly of Colloidal Microsphere Coatings for Biotechnology Applications
by Jessica S. Jenkins, Michael C. Flickinger and Orlin D. Velev
Coatings 2013, 3(1), 26-48; https://doi.org/10.3390/coatings3010026 - 06 Feb 2013
Cited by 14 | Viewed by 8940
Abstract
Continuous convective-sedimentation assembly (CCSA) is a deposition method that constantly supplies the coating suspension to the meniscus behind the coating knife by inline injection, allowing for steady-state deposition of ordered colloids (which may include particles or cells or live cell-particle blends) by water [...] Read more.
Continuous convective-sedimentation assembly (CCSA) is a deposition method that constantly supplies the coating suspension to the meniscus behind the coating knife by inline injection, allowing for steady-state deposition of ordered colloids (which may include particles or cells or live cell-particle blends) by water evaporation. The constant inflow of suspended particles available for transport to the drying front yields colloidal arrays with significantly larger surface areas than previously described and thus expands the ability of convective assembly to deposit monolayers or very thin films of multiple sizes of particles on large surfaces. Using sulfated polystyrene microspheres as a model system, this study shows how tunable process parameters, namely particle concentration, fluid sonication, and fluid density, influence coating homogeneity when the meniscus is continuously supplied. Fluid density and fluid flow-path sonication affect particle sedimentation and distribution. Coating microstructure, analyzed in terms of void space, does not vary significantly with relative humidity or suspended particle concentration. This study evaluated two configurations of the continuous convective assembly method in terms of ability to control coating microstructure by varying the number of suspended polymer particles available for transport to the coating drying front through variations in the meniscus volume. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advancing Coatings with Biotechnology)
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