Microwell-enhanced optical rapid antibiotic susceptibility testing of single bacteria

Ireneusz Rosłon; Aleksandre Japaridze; Stef Rodenhuis; Lieke Hamoen; Murali Krishna Ghatkesar; Peter Steeneken; Cees Dekker; Farbod Alijani

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2023.108268

Microwell-enhanced optical rapid antibiotic susceptibility testing of single bacteria

iScience. 2023 Oct 20;26(11):108268. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2023.108268. eCollection 2023 Nov 17.

Authors

Ireneusz Rosłon^{1

2}, Aleksandre Japaridze^{1

2}, Stef Rodenhuis¹, Lieke Hamoen¹, Murali Krishna Ghatkesar¹, Peter Steeneken¹, Cees Dekker¹, Farbod Alijani¹

Affiliations

¹ Delft University of Technology, Mekelweg 2, Delft 2628 CD, the Netherlands.
² SoundCell B.V., Raamweg 20D, The Hague 2596HL, the Netherlands.

Abstract

Bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics present an increasing burden on healthcare. To address this emerging crisis, novel rapid antibiotic susceptibility testing (AST) methods are eagerly needed. Here, we present an optical AST technique that can determine the bacterial viability within 1 h down to a resolution of single bacteria. The method is based on measuring intensity fluctuations of a reflected laser focused on a bacterium in reflective microwells. Using numerical simulations, we show that both refraction and absorption of light by the bacterium contribute to the observed signal. By administering antibiotics that kill the bacteria, we show that the variance of the detected fluctuations vanishes within 1 h, indicating the potential of this technique for rapid sensing of bacterial antibiotic susceptibility. We envisage the use of this method for massively parallelizable AST tests and fast detection of drug-resistant pathogens.

Keywords: Medical Microbiology; Microbiology.