Role of Bacterial Adhesion in Their Subsurface Deposition and Transport: A Critical Review

This review seeks to consolidate the fundamental understanding of the relationship of bacterial interactions with bacterial adhesion and transport in the surrounding environment. In this review, up-to-date techniques for quantification of bacterial interactions with the surrounding environment as well as bacterial surface thermodynamic properties characterization are discussed. It is hypothesized that bacterial adhesion and transport are controlled by their interactions with the surrounding environment and these interactions are determined by bacterial surface thermodynamic properties. In this regard, besides bacterial interactions quantification using atomic force microscopy (AFM), bacterial interactions quantification based on bacterial surface thermodynamic properties are also reviewed. Bacterial adhesion and transport, quantified by bacterial transport observations or direct image capturing, are also discussed in this review. This review intends to cover the topics of surface chemistry, biology and contaminant hydrology, with a major focus on integration of fundamental theories with engineering applications.