Antibiotics (Feb 2021)

Antibacterial Effect of High-Purity Nisin Alone and in Combination with D-Amino Acids or Chlorhexidine in an Endodontic-Like Biofilm Model

  • Ericka T. Pinheiro,
  • Lamprini Karygianni,
  • Thomas Attin,
  • Thomas Thurnheer

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics10020149
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 10, no. 2
p. 149

Abstract

Read online

New strategies to eradicate endodontic biofilms are needed. Therefore, we evaluated the effect of high-purity nisin alone and in combination with D-amino acids (D-AAs) or chlorhexidine (CHX) against an “endodontic-like” biofilm model. Biofilms were grown on hydroxyapatite discs for 64 h and treated with nisin, eight D-AAs mixture, nisin + eight D-AAs, 2% CHX, and nisin + 2% CHX. After the 5 min and 24 h treatments, biofilm cells were harvested and total colony-forming units were counted. Differences between groups were tested by two-way ANOVA followed by Tukey’s multiple comparisons test (p p < 0.001). After 24 h, 2% CHX and nisin + 2% CHX drastically reduced bacterial counts. In conclusion, high-purity nisin alone or in combination with D-AAs did not show antibacterial activity against multispecies biofilms. Moreover, combined treatment using nisin and CHX showed similar antibiofilm activity compared with the use of CHX alone.

Keywords