Inhibition of Staphylococcus aureus biofilm by a copper-bearing 317L-Cu stainless steel and its corrosion resistance

By Da Sun and Dake Xu and Chunguang Yang and Jia Chen and M. Babar Shahzad and Ziqing Sun and Jinlong Zhao and Tingyue Gu and Ke Yang and Guixue Wang
Published in Materials Science and Engineering: C NULL 2016

Abstract

The present study investigated the antibacterial performance, corrosion resistance and surface properties of antibacterial austenitic 317L-Cu stainless steel (317L-Cu SS). After 4.5 wt% copper was added to 317L stainless steel (317L SS), the new alloy underwent solid solution and aging heat treatment. Fluorescent staining using 4?,6-diamidino-2-phenylindole (DAPI) revealed that the 317L-Cu \SS\ showed strong antibacterial efficacy, achieving a 99% inhibition rate of sessile Staphylococcus aureus cells after 5 days. The corrosion data obtained by potentiodynamic polarization curves indicated that in comparison with 317L SS, the pitting potential and corrosion current density of 317L-Cu slightly decreased due to the addition of Cu. The 317L-Cu \SS\ exhibited no cytotoxicity against zebrafish (Danio rerio) embryos. The experimental results in this study demonstrated that the new alloy has potential applications in medical and daily uses.

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