Antibiofilm surfaces based on the immobilization of a novel recombinant antimicrobial multidomain protein using self-assembled monolayers

The constant increase of microorganisms resistant to antibiotics has been classified as a global health emergency, which is especially challenging when biofilms are formed. Herein, novel biofunctionalized gold surfaces with the antimicrobial multidomain recombinant protein JAMF1, both in the soluble form and nanostructured as nanoparticles, were developed. The interaction between His-tag termination of the protein and a nitriloacetic acid-Ni complex formed on mixed self-assembled monolayers (mixed SAMs) was exploited. The obtained antibiofilm surfaces based on the immobilization of the novel JAMF1 protein using self-assembled monolayers were characterized using a multi-technique approach including: cyclic voltammetry, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, atomic force microscopy and fluorescence, proving that the modification and immobilization of JAMF1 were successfully done. The antibiofilm activity against Escherichia coli and carbapenem-resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae showed that the immobilized antimicrobial proteins were able to reduce biofilm formation of both microorganisms. This strategy opens up new possibilities for controlled biomolecule immobilization for fundamental biological studies and biotechnological applications, at the interface of materials science and molecular biology. ; This work has been developed under the Biochemistry and Biomedicine and Materials Science Program of Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB). The characterization has been performed by the ICTS ‘‘NANBIOSIS’’, more specifically by the Biomaterial Processing and Nanostructuring Unit (U6), Unit of CIBER-BBN located at ICMAB-CSIC. Authors are grateful for the financial support received from MICINN (PID2020-115296RA-I00 and PID2019–105622RB-I00), the Networking Research Center on Bioengineering, Biomaterials, and Nanomedicine (CIBER-BBN), GenCat (grant 2017-SGR-918, SGR Cat 2021-00438 and CERCA programme), the European Social Fund, and Fundació La Marató de TV3 (Nr. 201812). This project has received funding from the European ...