The Effect of Morphological Surface Inhomogeneities on the Mycological Resistance of Polymer Films

Polymer materials, such as polyethylene, polypropylene, polyvinyl chloride, polybutadiene, and polyethylene terephthalate, are widely used in medicine, agriculture, mechanical engineering, and the textiles industry. As a result of the experimental study of these materials as concerns mycological resistance to the development and destructive effect of a mixed micromycete colony of Aspergillus Niger, Aspergillus Terreus, and Penicillium Cyclopium, it has been shown that polyethylene terephthalate and polyvinyl chloride have the highest and the lowest mycological resistance, respectively. It has been suggested that there exists a nonlinear relation between the free surface energy values of the studied materials and the degree of their mycological stability. Based on the analysis of the corresponding optical images, an approach to modeling the surface textures of experimental samples and a quantitative description of the dynamics of the development of microorganism colonies has been proposed.