Emerging antibiotic resistance among pathogenic bacteria, paired with their ability to form biofilms on medical and technical devices, represents a serious problem for effective and long-term decontamination in health-care environments and gives rise to an urgent need for new antimicrobial materials. Here we present the impact of AGXX^®, a novel broad-spectrum antimicrobial surface coating consisting of micro-galvanic elements formed by silver and ruthenium, on the transcriptome of Enterococcus faecalis. A clinical E. faecalis isolate was subjected to metal stress by growing it for different periods in presence of the antimicrobial coating or silver-coated steel meshes. Subsequently, total RNA was isolated and next-generation RNA sequencing was performed to analyze variations in gene expression in presence of the antimicrobial materials with focus on known stress genes. Exposure to the antimicrobial coating had a large impact on the transcriptome of E. faecalis. After 24 min almost 1/5 of the E. faecalis genome displayed differential expression. At each time-point the cop operon was strongly up-regulated, providing indirect evidence for the presence of free Ag⁺-ions. Moreover, exposure to the antimicrobial coating induced a broad general stress response in E. faecalis. Genes coding for the chaperones GroEL and GroES and the Clp proteases, ClpE and ClpB, were among the top up-regulated heat shock genes. Differential expression of thioredoxin, superoxide dismutase and glutathione synthetase genes indicates a high level of oxidative stress. We postulate a mechanism of action where the combination of Ag⁺-ions and reactive oxygen species generated by AGXX^® results in a synergistic antimicrobial effect, superior to that of conventional silver coatings.

病原细菌中新出现的抗生素耐药性，加上它们在医疗和技术设备上形成生物膜的能力，代表了在医疗保健环境中进行有效和长期净化的严重问题，并迫切需要新的抗菌材料。这里，我们提出AGXX的影响^®，一种新型的广谱抗微生物表面涂层包括由银和钌形成的微电元件的上的转录粪肠球菌。临床粪肠球菌通过在抗菌涂层或镀银钢网的存在下​​使其生长不同的时间，使分离物经受金属应力。随后，分离总RNA，并进行下一代RNA测序，以分析存在抗微生物物质的基因表达的变化，重点是已知的应激基因。暴露于抗菌涂层对粪肠球菌的转录组有很大影响。24分钟后，几乎1/5的粪肠球菌基因组显示出差异表达。在每个时间点，警察操纵子都被上调，为存在游离Ag ⁺的存在提供间接证据。离子。此外，暴露于抗菌涂层在粪肠球菌中引起广泛的一般应激反应。编码伴侣GroEL和GroES以及Clp蛋白酶ClpE和ClpB的基因是上调的热休克基因之一。硫氧还蛋白，超氧化物歧化酶和谷胱甘肽合成酶基因的差异表达表明高水平的氧化应激。我们假定的作用机制，其中Ag的组合⁺通过AGXX生成-离子和活性氧^®在协同抗微生物效应的结果，优于以往的银涂层。