Some Finite Difference Methods to Model Biofilm Growth and Decay: Classical and Non-Standard

Abstract

The study of biofilm formation is undoubtedly important due to micro-organisms forming a protected mode from the host defense mechanism, which may result in alteration in the host gene transcription and growth rate. A mathematical model of the nonlinear advection–diffusion–reaction equation has been studied for biofilm formation. In this paper, we present two novel non-standard finite difference schemes to obtain an approximate solution to the mathematical model of biofilm formation. One explicit non-standard finite difference scheme is proposed for biomass density equation and one property-conserving scheme for a coupled substrate–biomass system of equations. The nonlinear term in the mathematical model has been handled efficiently. The proposed schemes maintain dynamical consistency (positivity, boundedness, merging of colonies, biofilm annihilation), which is revealed through experimental observation. In order to verify the accuracy and effectiveness of our proposed schemes, we compare our results with those obtained from standard finite difference schemes and earlier known results in the literature. The proposed schemes (NSFD1 and NSFD2) show good performance. The NSFD2 scheme reveals that the processes of biofilm formation and nutritive substrate growth are intricately linked.

Keywords

• biofilm
• non-standard finite difference
• advection–diffusion–reaction
• positivity