Author(s)

Ernesto Suaste-Gómez^1*, Grissel Rodríguez-Roldán¹, Ilian Pérez-Solis¹, Ana Laura Torres-Huerta², Carlos Cruz-Cruz³, José Tapia-Ramírez²

¹Department of Electrical Engineering, Section of Bioelectronics, Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute (CINVESTAV), Mexico City, Mexico.
²National Laboratory of Experimental Services (LaNSE), CINVESTAV, Mexico City, Mexico.
³Department of Genetics and Molecular Biology, CINVESTAV, Mexico City, Mexico.

Vaginal infections are suffered by millions of women of reproductive age. Recent research has shown that timely diagnosis of these infections avoids complications in the patient’s health. Since the symptoms of infections caused by yeast and bacteria are similar, the patient is not always treated properly. Membranes with three different thicknesses (66 μm, 83 μm, 128 μm) were produced by electrospinning of polylactic polymer (PLA) and were used as a biological sieve to detect microorganisms present in vaginal infections, bacteria or yeasts. Electrospinning technique is a technique that allows the generation of membranes from nanofibers of material polymeric and therefore, obtaining porous structures. The size of the fibers was observed as well as the morphology and the size of the pores, using the scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The effectiveness of these membranes was proven by the cultivation of the bacteria that passed through the polymeric membrane and the yeasts retained by it. The membranes allowed the retention of yeasts of Candida albicans type with dimensions of 7 μm, which allowed the separation of Brevibacterium ravens purgense bacteria with dimensions of 1.4 μm, thus demonstrating their effectiveness as biological sieve.

Biological Sieve, Electrospinning, Polylactic Acid, Vaginal Infections

Suaste-Gómez, E. , Rodríguez-Roldán, G. , Pérez-Solis, I. , Torres-Huerta, A. , Cruz-Cruz, C. and Tapia-Ramírez, J. (2022) Electrospinning Polylactic Acid Polymer Membranes as Biological Sieve for Yeast and Bacteria. Materials Sciences and Applications, 13, 389-400. doi: 10.4236/msa.2022.136022.