A method for microbial cell surface fingerprinting based on surface plasmon resonance.

A method for microbial cell surface fingerprinting using surface plasmon resonance (SPR) is suggested. Four different Escherichia coli mutants have been used as model cells. Cell surface fingerprints were generated by registration of the interaction between the cell mutants and four different surfaces, with different physical and chemical properties, when a cell suspension was flown over the surface. Significant differences in fingerprint pattern between some of the mutants were observed. At the same time, the physical properties of the cell surfaces were determined using microelectrophoresis, contact angle measurements and aqueous two-phase partitioning and compared to the SPR fingerprints. The generated cell surface fingerprints and the physical property data were evaluated with multivariate data analysis that showed that the cells were separated into individual groups in a similar way using principal component analysis plots (PCA).