Beyond surface modification strategies to control infections associated with implanted biomaterials and devices - addressing the opportunities offered by nanotechnology

Biomaterial-associated infection (BAI) is considered a unique infection due to the presence of a biomaterial yielding frustrated immune-cells, ineffective in clearing local micro-organisms. The involvement of surface-adherent/surface-adapted micro-organisms in BAI, logically points to biomaterial surface-modifications for BAI-control. Biomaterial surface-modification is most suitable for prevention before adhering bacteria have grown into a mature biofilm, while BAI-treatment is virtually impossible through surface-modification. Hundreds of different surface-modifications have been proposed for BAI-control but few have passed clinical trials due to the statistical near-impossibility of benefit-demonstration. Yet, no biomaterial surface-modification forwarded, is clinically embraced. Collectively, this leads us to conclude that surface-modification is a dead-end road. Accepting that BAI is, like most human infections, due to surface-adherent biofilms (though not always to a foreign material), and regarding BAI as a common infection, opens a more-generally-applicable and therewith easier-to-validate road. Pre-clinical models have shown that stimuli-responsive nano-antimicrobials and antibiotic-loaded nanocarriers exhibit prolonged blood-circulation times and can respond to a biofilm’s micro-environment to penetrate and accumulate within biofilms, prompt ROS-generation and synergistic killing with antibiotics of antibiotic-resistant pathogens without inducing further antimicrobial-resistance. Moreover, they can boost frustrated immune-cells around a biomaterial reducing the importance of this unique BAI-feature. Time to start exploring the nano-road for BAI-control.