Which Parameters Affect Biofilm Removal with Acoustic Cavitation? A Review.

Bacterial biofilms are a cause of contamination in a wide range of medical and biological areas. Ultrasound is a mechanical energy that can remove these biofilms using cavitation and acoustic streaming, which generate shear forces to disrupt biofilm from a surface. The aim of this narrative review is to investigate the literature on the mechanical removal of biofilm using acoustic cavitation to identify the different operating parameters affecting its removal using this method. The properties of the liquid and the properties of the ultrasound have a large impact on the type of cavitation generated. These include gas content, temperature, surface tension, frequency of ultrasound and acoustic pressure. For many of these parameters, more research is required to understand their mechanisms in the area of ultrasonic biofilm removal, and further research will help to optimise this method for effective removal of biofilms from different surfaces.

Acoustic microbubble dynamics with viscous effects.

Microbubble dynamics subject to ultrasound are associated with important applications in biomedical ultrasonics, sonochemistry and cavitation cleaning. The viscous effects in this phenomenon is essential since the Reynolds number Re associated is about O(10). The flow field is characterized as being an irrotational flow in the bulk volume but with a thin vorticity layer at the bubble surface. This paper investigates the phenomenon using the boundary integral method based on the viscous potential flow theory. The viscous effects are incorporated into the model through including the normal viscous stress of the irrotational flow in the dynamic boundary condition at the bubble surface. The viscous correction pressure of Joseph & Wang (2004) is implemented to resolve the discrepancy between the non-zero shear stress of the irrotational flow at a free surface and the physical boundary condition of zero shear stress. The model agrees well with the Rayleigh-Plesset equation for a spherical bubble oscillating in a viscous liquid for several cycles of oscillation for Re=10. It correlates pretty closely with both the experimental data and the axisymmetric simulation based on the Navier-Stokes equations for transient bubble dynamics near a rigid boundary. We further analyze microbubble dynamics near a rigid boundary subject to ultrasound travelling perpendicular and parallel to the boundary, respectively, in parameter regions of clinical relevance. The viscous effects to acoustic microbubble dynamics are analyzed in terms of the jet velocity, bubble volume, centroid movement, Kelvin impulse and bubble energy.

Cell mechanics in biomedical cavitation.

Studies on the deformation behaviours of cellular entities, such as coated microbubbles and liposomes subject to a cavitation flow, become increasingly important for the advancement of ultrasonic imaging and drug delivery. Numerical simulations for bubble dynamics of ultrasound contrast agents based on the boundary integral method are presented in this work. The effects of the encapsulating shell are estimated by adapting Hoff's model used for thin-shell contrast agents. The viscosity effects are estimated by including the normal viscous stress in the boundary condition. In parallel, mechanical models of cell membranes and liposomes as well as state-of-the-art techniques for quantitative measurement of viscoelasticity for a single cell or coated microbubbles are reviewed. The future developments regarding modelling and measurement of the material properties of the cellular entities for cutting-edge biomedical applications are also discussed.