Dataset Information

From swimming to swarming: Escherichia coli cell motility in two-dimensions.

ABSTRACT: Escherichia coli swarmer cells coordinate their movement when confined in thin layers of fluid on agar surfaces. The motion and dynamics of cells, pairs of cells, and packs of cells can be recapitulated and studied in polymer microfluidic systems that are designed to constrain swarmer cell movement in thin layers of fluid between no-slip surfaces. The motion of elongated, smooth swimming E. coli cells in these environments reproduces the behavior of packs of cells observed at the leading edge of swarming communities and demonstrates the delicate balance between the physical dimensions of fluids and bacterial cell behavior.

SUBMITTER: Swiecicki JM

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4222179 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

From swimming to swarming: Escherichia coli cell motility in two-dimensions.

Swiecicki Jean-Marie JM Sliusarenko Olesksii O Weibel Douglas B DB

Integrative biology : quantitative biosciences from nano to macro 20131201 12

Escherichia coli swarmer cells coordinate their movement when confined in thin layers of fluid on agar surfaces. The motion and dynamics of cells, pairs of cells, and packs of cells can be recapitulated and studied in polymer microfluidic systems that are designed to constrain swarmer cell movement in thin layers of fluid between no-slip surfaces. The motion of elongated, smooth swimming E. coli cells in these environments reproduces the behavior of packs of cells observed at the leading edge of ...[more]

PMID: 24145500

Similar Datasets

Project description:Aeromonas caviae is motile via a polar flagellum in liquid culture, with a lateral flagella system used for swarming on solid surfaces. The polar flagellum also has a role in cellular adherence and biofilm formation. The two subunits of the polar flagellum, FlaA and FlaB, are posttranslationally modified by O-linked glycosylation with pseudaminic acid on 6-8 serine and threonine residues within the central region of these proteins. This modification is essential for the formation of the flagellum. Aeromonas caviae possesses the simplest set of genes required for bacterial glycosylation currently known, with the putative glycosyltransferase, Maf1, being described recently. Here, we investigated the role of the AHA0618 gene, which shares homology (37% at the amino acid level) with the central region of a putative deglycosylation enzyme (HP0518) from the human pathogen Helicobacter pylori, which also glycosylates its flagellin and is proposed to be part of a flagellin deglycosylation pathway. Phenotypic analysis of an AHA0618 A. caviae mutant revealed increased swimming and swarming motility compared to the wild-type strain but without any detectable effects on the glycosylation status of the polar flagellins when analyzed by western blot analysis or mass spectroscopy. Bioinformatic analysis of the protein AHA0618, demonstrated homology to a family of l,d-transpeptidases involved in cell wall biology and peptidoglycan cross-linking (YkuD-like). Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and fluorescence microscopy analysis of the wild-type and AHA0618-mutant A. caviae strains revealed the mutant to be subtly but significantly shorter than wild-type cells; a phenomenon that could be recovered when either AHA0618 or H. pylori HP0518 were introduced. We can therefore conclude that AHA0618 does not affect A. caviae behavior by altering polar flagellin glycosylation levels but is likely to have a role in peptidoglycan processing at the bacterial cell wall, consequently altering cell length and hence influencing motility.

Project description:BACKGROUND: Bacterial motility is a crucial factor in the colonization of natural environments. Escherichia coli has two flagella-driven motility types: swimming and swarming. Swimming motility consists of individual cell movement in liquid medium or soft semisolid agar, whereas swarming is a coordinated cellular behaviour leading to a collective movement on semisolid surfaces. It is known that swimming motility can be influenced by several types of environmental stress. In nature, environmentally induced DNA damage (e.g. UV irradiation) is one of the most common types of stress. One of the key proteins involved in the response to DNA damage is RecA, a multifunctional protein required for maintaining genome integrity and the generation of genetic variation. RESULTS: The ability of E. coli cells to develop swarming migration on semisolid surfaces was suppressed in the absence of RecA. However, swimming motility was not affected. The swarming defect of a DeltarecA strain was fully complemented by a plasmid-borne recA gene. Although the DeltarecA cells grown on semisolid surfaces exhibited flagellar production, they also presented impaired individual movement as well as a fully inactive collective swarming migration. Both the comparative analysis of gene expression profiles in wild-type and DeltarecA cells grown on a semisolid surface and the motility of lexA1 [Ind-] mutant cells demonstrated that the RecA effect on swarming does not require induction of the SOS response. By using a RecA-GFP fusion protein we were able to segregate the effect of RecA on swarming from its other functions. This protein fusion failed to regulate the induction of the SOS response, the recombinational DNA repair of UV-treated cells and the genetic recombination, however, it was efficient in rescuing the swarming motility defect of the DeltarecA mutant. The RecA-GFP protein retains a residual ssDNA-dependent ATPase activity but does not perform DNA strand exchange. CONCLUSION: The experimental evidence presented in this work supports a novel role for RecA: the promotion of swarming motility. The defective swarming migration of DeltarecA cells does not appear to be associated with defective flagellar production; rather, it seems to be associated with an abnormal flagellar propulsion function. Our results strongly suggest that the RecA effect on swarming motility does not require an extensive canonical RecA nucleofilament formation. RecA is the first reported cellular factor specifically affecting swarming but not swimming motility in E. coli. The integration of two apparently disconnected biologically important processes, such as the maintenance of genome integrity and motility in a unique protein, may have important evolutive consequences.

Dataset Information

From swimming to swarming: Escherichia coli cell motility in two-dimensions.

Publications

From swimming to swarming: Escherichia coli cell motility in two-dimensions.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets