Quantification, Identification, and Visualization

Quantification

There are several methods for quantifying microbial cells which comprise a biofilm including plate counts, total counts, and  qPCR. The volumetric measurements of biofilm mass can be made by performing image analysis on microscopic images of biofilms.

Identification

There are a variety of molecular methods for identifying individual bacterial species/strains.

Visualization

There are several techniques which can be used to visualize biofilms including confocal scanning laser microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, two-photon laser microscopy, and magnetic resonance imaging.

Biofilm Research Tools Summary

In summary most biofilm research is done at the micro and mesoscale. This research is of keen interest to a wide spectrum of industries which have very diverse systems. It is often difficult to scale up the information observed at the micro and meso scale directly to macro scale and more research on how to better perform up scaling in definitely needed.