Conductivity and Dielectric Dispersion of Gram-Positive Bacterial Cells

Abstract

The conductivity of bacterial cell suspensions has been studied over a wide range of ionic strengths and is interpreted in terms of their cell wall properties. The experimental data have been analyzed after improving the high κadouble-layer theory of Fixman, by accounting for ionic mobility in the hydrodynamically stagnant layer, i.e., in the bacterial wall. Static conductivity and dielectric dispersion measurements both show that the counterions in the porous gel-like cell wall give rise to a considerable surface conductance. From a comparison of the mobile charge with the total cell wall charge it is inferred that the mobilities of the ions in the bacterial wall are of the same order but somewhat lower than those in the bulk electrolyte solution. The occurrence of surface conductance reduces the electrophoretic mobility in electrophoresis studies. If this effect is not taken into account, the ζ-potential will be underestimated, especially at low electrolyte concentrations.