Controlling for DMSO

Accounting for DMSO in biofilm studies.

Kate Summer et al. recently published an open access manuscript in Biofilm, for which Quantecol conducted the statistical analysis.

The authors make a strong case for controlling for the effects of the solvent dimethyl-sulfoxide (DMSO) in biofilm studies. In addition to a literature review of 76 published studies, Summer conducted experiments on the bacteria Streptococcus pneumoniae and Pseudomonas aeruginosa to determine to what extent DMSO affected biofilm formation. We analysed the microbial activity and biofilm inhibition in these experiments using hormetic dose-response models.