More advanced studies such as high - resolution imaging and changes in protein expression have recently shown that on different topographies or within the same , some bacteria can be impaled or deformed on nanopillars , and some exhibit an enhanced oxidative stress response , resulting in mechanically ruptured and lysed cells or not . [ 44,46 ] This multitude of scenarios suggests that either several mechanisms exist at once for some structures , or one dominates , driven by a particularity of the topography - bacterium pair ( and likely environment ) . Therefore , to elucidate the underlying mechanism , we further probe the surface by SEM imaging ( Figure 5d - f ) and discover the significantly lower number of adhered bacteria to the nanostructures than to the controls , also observing that ≈50 % of those attached cells are ruptured / lysed ( see the Experimental Section ) . Amongst the bacteria that appear intact on the nanostructures , we note they appear flattened / deformed when resting on nanopillars , yet there are no clear signs of their disintegration ( debris or cytosolic content visible ) . This can be attributed to cellular leakage ( washed away ) , loss of turgor pressure , and/or . The photopic response of the human eye is shown with light blue shaded area . c ) Measured and calculated transmission of C and DS samples as a function of incident angle for incoherent , unpolarized light , for photopic calibrated data . d ) Top : Sequential images of a droplet impacting a surface with an initial diameter D 0 = 2.7 mm , expanding to a maximum diameter D max = 9.45 mm as it spreads on the surface , followed by retraction and take - off . The corresponding plot of drop diameter versus time with the y - axis normalized to D 0 is shown for P100 ( gray ) and P400 ( pink ) at two impacting velocities : 1.0 m s −1 ( dots ) and 2.0 m s −1 ( circles ) . The average contact time < τ > of the droplet with the surface is indicated to be 13.4 ms and 17.8 ms for P100 and P400 , respectively . e ) Calculated capillary pressure P c plotted for nanocones of pitch 50 , 100 , and 200 nm , as a function of the penetration percentage ( z / h ) , where z is the depth of meniscus penetration and h is the total height . The water hammer pressure generated at impacts of 20 and 110 kph are marked on the graph , with varying values for the water hammer pressure coefficient K WH . The bottom row of schematics serves as a representation of the penetration depth z / h. stretching deformation upon adhesion ( which likely is pre-(full ) rupture provided the number of dead bacteria found by fluorescent imaging which scores viability based on the membrane integrity ) . Analysis of the average cell surface area and its distribution ( Figure 5f ; see the Experimental Section ) reveals an increase , further confirming the bacteria are flattened . Nonetheless , although made of glass , we can not exclude the role of pillar flexibility due to their fine size , evidenced in Figure S23 in the Supporting Information , to contribute to the overall performance via a recently proposed energy storage - release mechanism . [ 48 ] Overall , this demonstration of antibacterial glass indicates that at p ≈ 100 nm , S. aureus is killed with an efficiency matching the best reported structures in silicon , leading to bacteria lysis through stretch - and - rupturing and likely piercing , enhanced by the deflection of nanopillars . Further gains in performance are anticipated by adjusting the AR , however we reserve this investigation for future studies , and instead place emphasis on the potential of RSML as a fabrication tool in controllable nanoscale glass etching to achieve such functionalities .