The company has recently initiated a new collaboration with a Japanese corporation, specifically for a special kind of filter systems and are open to other anti-fouling applications for their coatings. The company’s bioactive coatings are based on self-assembling so-called S-layer proteins that naturally occur on a large variety of bacteria and archeae.
The company has isolated bacteria strains and S-layer proteins and genes that can be utilized to create uniform, reproducible self-assembling protein coatings on various surfaces including plastics, metals, glass, etc. Such coatings have anti-fouling properties (i.e. prevent attachment of bacteria, biofilms, etc.) and can be chemically treated to endure prolonged exposure to high temperatures, very low as well as very high pH-levels, and high pressure.
Bacterial surface layer proteins have the intrinsic ability to form reproducible, uniform, stable crystalline nanomolecular coatings on various surfaces ranging from glass, metals and plastics to lipid films. Under defined conditions they can bind biomolecules.
At the same time S-layers act as repellent to any proteins which might unspecifically bind to the S-layer-coated surface. Finally S-layers have a sieve-like structure in the nanoscale with defined pore sizes of around 10nm. Over the past 20 years the so-called S-layer technology platform has been developed by the Centre of Nanobiotechnology utilizing the vast potential of S-layer proteins. Today it is possible to coat different surfaces, create S-layer patterns on the surfaces, stabilize lipids with the S-layer, immobilize biomolecules in a well-defined, reproducible, dense and oriented way on the S-layer and to create S-layer fusion proteins, which form nanomolecular layers with intrinsic biological activity such as antigen binding properties. S-layers have also been used as nanomolecular sieves.
