Spatially resolved force spectroscopy of bacterial surfaces using force-volume imaging

Abstract

Force spectroscopy using the atomic force microscope (AFM) is a powerful technique for measuring physical properties and interaction forces at microbial cell surfaces. Typically for such a study, the point at which a force measurement will be made is located by first imaging the cell using AFM in contact mode. In this study, we image the bacterial cell Shewanella putrefaciens for subsequent force measurements using AFM in force-volume mode and compare this to contact-mode images. It is known that contact-mode imaging does not accurately locate the apical surface and periphery of the cell since, in contact mode, a component of the applied load laterally deforms the cell during the raster scan..