Bacterial biofilms and the bioelectric effect.

Bacterial biofilms are acknowledged to be a major factor in problems of ineffective sterilization often encountered in clinics, hospitals, and industrial processes. There have been indications that the addition of a relatively small direct current electric field with the sterilant used to combat the biofilm greatly increases the efficacy of the sterilization process. The results of the experiments reported in this paper support the concept of the "bioelectric effect" as reported by J.W. Costerton, B. Ellis, K. Lam, F. Johnson, and A.E. Khoury (Antimicrob. Agents Chemother, 38:2803-2809, 1994). With a current of 1 mA flowing through the chamber containing the biofilm, an increase in the killing of the bacteria of about 8 log orders was observed at the end of 24 h (compared with the control with the same amount of antibacterial agent but no current). We also confirmed that the current alone does not affect the biofilm and that there appear to be optimum levels of both the current and the sterilant that are needed to obtain the maximum effect.