Nanomechanical Characterization of Bacillus anthracis Spores by Atomic Force Microscopy.

ABSTRACT:

Unlabelled

The study of structures and properties of bacterial spores is important to understanding spore formation and biological responses to environmental stresses. While significant progress has been made over the years in elucidating the multilayer architecture of spores, the mechanical properties of the spore interior are not known. Here, we present a thermal atomic force microscopy (AFM) study of the nanomechanical properties of internal structures of Bacillus anthracis spores. We developed a nanosurgical sectioning method in which a stiff diamond AFM tip was used to cut an individual spore, exposing its internal structure, and a soft AFM tip was used to image and characterize the spore interior on the nanometer scale. We observed that the elastic modulus and adhesion force,

SUBMITTER: Li AG 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4959069 | biostudies-literature | 2016 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature