Field Turf Microbial Survivorship by Teddy Larkin

Introduction Sports are a common part of life from lower school physical fitness to the high level of professional sports. Artificial turf fields are used for many of these sports activities. Artificial turf was developed by Dr. David Chaney. Today it is a standard surface for school football fields, playgrounds, and professional arenas.

Intro Artificial turf is a incomparable surface for field turf use since it is always bright and nice to look at, never needs watering, and is a fairly cheap playing surface to maintain.

Intro A recent local news article reported findings of bacteria on soccer balls. Methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) was found on the balls and an aggressive ball cleaning procedure with bleach was started. MRSA has also been reported in brush burns and lacerations from falls on the artificial turf.

Intro Methicillin-resistant strains of Staphylococcus aureus were first recognized in 1961, one year after the antibiotic methicillin was introduced for treating S. aureus infections. MRSA is resistant to all beta- lactam antibiotics.

Intro The first documented MRSA outbreak in the United States occurred at a Boston hospital in For the next two decades most MRSA infections occurred in persons who had contact with hospitals or other healthcare settings (healthcare- associated MRSA). Today, MRSA infections are now seen in healthy persons.

Intro S. Aureus is most often spread to others by contamination of the hands. The skin and mucous membranes is usually an effective barrier against infection. However, if these barriers are breached S. aureus may gain access to underlying tissues or the bloodstream and cause infection.

Intro The seriousness of this bacterial infection and finding of it on common pieces of sports equipment led me to wonder that if these germs were growing on soccer balls then what was growing on the artificial turf fields that the balls were being rubbed against all day. Blood, sweat, and tears plus your everyday old spit are a part of all sports, just as are cuts, turf burns and abrasions.

What’s Growing out there? The experiment was designed to determine if artificial turf serves as a media for bacterial growth and if so what was the bacteria survive time on the turf.

Turf Composition Beads Fibers Silica sand Backing

Bead Composition Cryogenic Rubber a.Recycled rubber b.Frozen & shattered c.Forms smooth-sided spherical particles. d.Rounded so it does not attract microscopic bubbles of air. As a result it does not float nor displace in high use areas. Ambient Rubber a.Recycled rubber b.Jagged, floats and moves with the water flow, migrating to the edges of the field.

Turf Beads

E Coli The bacteria used in this experiment on the field turf fragments is Escherichia Coli.

Escherichia Coli rod-shaped gram negative bacteria 2 micrometers diameter reproduction rate: double every 20 minutes Survival, growth and replication require only a single carbon source and ammonium salts

Purpose The purpose of this experiment is to see if bacteria can survive on field fragments over time.

Hypothesis Artificial turf is a potential source for bacterial growth. The daily use of the surfaces and exposure of the surface to body secretions of sweat, mucous, blood, and tears combined with variable drainage and temperature exposure with no source of regular cleaning makes the surface a potential source for bacterial growth.

Hypothesis The field turf fragment samples with beads should be able to grow more bacteria than the fragment samples without beads. Artificial turf surfaces are a potential site for sustained bacterial growth