Antibacterial adhesion of borneol-based polymer via surface chiral stereochemistry

During its adhesion on external surfaces, a cell exhibits obvious inclination to different molecular chirality, which encourages us to develop a new type of antibacterial material catering to the "chiral taste" of bacteria. On the basis of the natural product borneol (a camphane-type bicyclic monoterpene), a series of borneol-based polymer, polyborneolacrylate (PBA), was successfully prepared and showed superior antibacterial adhesion properties resulting from the borneol isomers on material surface. The results of this study reveal that bacteria simply dislike this type of stubborn surface of PBA, and the PBA surface stereochemistry contributes to the interfacial antibacterial activities. The PBA polymers were evaluated as noncytotoxic and can be simply synthesized, demonstrating their great potential for biomedical applications.