Browse
Submit Data
Databases
API
Help

Dataset Information

24 Views

0 Connections

0 Citations

0 Reanalyses

0 Downloads

Omics score: 0

Self-organization of swimmers drives long-range fluid transport in bacterial colonies.

ABSTRACT: Motile subpopulations in microbial communities are believed to be important for dispersal, quest for food, and material transport. Here, we show that motile cells in sessile colonies of peritrichously flagellated bacteria can self-organize into two adjacent, centimeter-scale motile rings surrounding the entire colony. The motile rings arise from spontaneous segregation of a homogeneous swimmer suspension that mimics a phase separation; the process is mediated by intercellular interactions and shear-induced depletion. As a result of this self-organization, cells drive fluid flows that circulate around the colony at a constant peak speed of ~30?µm?s^-1, providing a stable and high-speed avenue for directed material transport at the macroscopic scale. Our findings present a unique form of bacterial self-organization that influences population structure and material distribution in colonies.

SUBMITTER: Xu H

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6470179 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Json Xml

Publications

Self-organization of swimmers drives long-range fluid transport in bacterial colonies.

Xu Haoran H Dauparas Justas J Das Debasish D Lauga Eric E Wu Yilin Y

Nature communications 20190417 1

Motile subpopulations in microbial communities are believed to be important for dispersal, quest for food, and material transport. Here, we show that motile cells in sessile colonies of peritrichously flagellated bacteria can self-organize into two adjacent, centimeter-scale motile rings surrounding the entire colony. The motile rings arise from spontaneous segregation of a homogeneous swimmer suspension that mimics a phase separation; the process is mediated by intercellular interactions and sh ...[more]

PMID: 30996269

Similar Datasets

Self-organization in high-density bacterial colonies: efficient crowd control.

Project description:Colonies of bacterial cells can display complex collective dynamics, frequently culminating in the formation of biofilms and other ordered super-structures. Recent studies suggest that to cope with local environmental challenges, bacterial cells can actively seek out small chambers or cavities and assemble there, engaging in quorum sensing behavior. By using a novel microfluidic device, we showed that within chambers of distinct shapes and sizes allowing continuous cell escape, bacterial colonies can gradually self-organize. The directions of orientation of cells, their growth, and collective motion are mutually correlated and dictated by the chamber walls and locations of chamber exits. The ultimate highly organized steady state is conducive to a more-organized escape of cells from the chambers and increased access of nutrients into and evacuation of waste out of the colonies. Using a computational model, we suggest that the lengths of the cells might be optimized to maximize self-organization while minimizing the potential for stampede-like exit blockage. The self-organization described here may be crucial for the early stage of the organization of high-density bacterial colonies populating small, physically confined growth niches. It suggests that this phenomenon can play a critical role in bacterial biofilm initiation and development of other complex multicellular bacterial super-structures, including those implicated in infectious diseases.

| S-EPMC2043048 | biostudies-literature

Self-organized canals enable long-range directed material transport in bacterial communities.

Project description:Long-range material transport is essential to maintain the physiological functions of multicellular organisms such as animals and plants. By contrast, material transport in bacteria is often short-ranged and limited by diffusion. Here, we report a unique form of actively regulated long-range directed material transport in structured bacterial communities. Using Pseudomonas aeruginosa colonies as a model system, we discover that a large-scale and temporally evolving open-channel system spontaneously develops in the colony via shear-induced banding. Fluid flows in the open channels support high-speed (up to 450 µm/s) transport of cells and outer membrane vesicles over centimeters, and help to eradicate colonies of a competing species Staphylococcus aureus. The open channels are reminiscent of human-made canals for cargo transport, and the channel flows are driven by interfacial tension mediated by cell-secreted biosurfactants. The spatial-temporal dynamics of fluid flows in the open channels are qualitatively described by flow profile measurement and mathematical modeling. Our findings demonstrate that mechanochemical coupling between interfacial force and biosurfactant kinetics can coordinate large-scale material transport in primitive life forms, suggesting a new principle to engineer self-organized microbial communities.

| S-EPMC9633063 | biostudies-literature

Complex photonic response reveals three-dimensional self-organization of structural coloured bacterial colonies.

Project description:Vivid colours found in living organisms are often the result of scattering from hierarchical nanostructures, where the interplay between order and disorder in their packing defines visual appearance. In the case of Flavobacterium IR1, the complex arrangement of the cells in polycrystalline three-dimensional lattices is found to be a distinctive fingerprint of colony organization. By combining analytical analysis of the angle-resolved scattering response of in vivo bacterial colonies with numerical modelling, we show that we can assess the inter-cell distance and cell diameter with a resolution below 10 nm, far better than what can be achieved with conventional electron microscopy, suffering from preparation artefacts. Retrieving the role of disorder at different length scales from the salient features in the scattering response enables a precise understanding of the structural organization of the bacteria.

| S-EPMC7276552 | biostudies-literature

Dynamic self-assembly and self-organized transport of magnetic micro-swimmers.

Project description:We demonstrate experimentally and in computer simulations that magnetic microfloaters can self-organize into various functional structures while energized by an external alternating (ac) magnetic field. The structures exhibit self-propelled motion and an ability to carry a cargo along a pre-defined path. The morphology of the self-assembled swimmers is controlled by the frequency and amplitude of the magnetic field.

| S-EPMC5677019 | biostudies-literature

Single Nanoparticle Tracking Reveals Efficient Long-Distance Undercurrent Transport in Upper Fluid of Bacterial Swarms.

Project description:Flagellated bacteria move collectively in a swirling pattern on agar surfaces immersed in a thin layer of viscous "swarm fluid," but the role of this fluid in mediating the cooperation of the bacterial population is not well understood. Herein, we use gold nanorods (AuNRs) as single particle tracers to explore the spatiotemporal structure of the swarm fluid. Individual AuNRs are moving in a plane of ∼2 μm above swarms, traveling for long distances in high speed without interferences from bacterial movements. The particles are lifted and transported by collective mixing of small vortices around bacteria during localized clustering and de-clustering of motile cells. Their motions fit the Lévy walk model, revealing efficient fluidic flows above the swarms. These flows provide obstacle-free highways for long-range material transportations, allow swarming bacteria to perform population-level communications, and imply the essential role of the fluid phase on the emergence of large-scale synergy.

| S-EPMC6881698 | biostudies-literature

Spatial Organization of Expanding Bacterial Colonies Is Affected by Contact-Dependent Growth Inhibition.

Project description:Identifying how microbes are able to manipulate, survive, and thrive in complex multispecies communities has expanded our understanding of how microbial ecosystems impact human health and the environment. The ability of bacteria to negatively affect neighbors, through explicit toxin delivery systems, provides them with an opportunity to manipulate the composition of growing microbial communities. Contact-dependent inhibition (CDI) systems (a Type Vb secretion system) are a distinct subset of competition systems whose contribution to shaping the development of spatially structured bacterial communities are yet to be fully understood. Here, we compare the impact of different CDI systems, at both the single-cell and population level, to determine the key drivers of CDI-mediated competition within spatially structured bacterial populations. Through an iterative approach using both an Escherichia coli experimental system and computational modeling, we show that CDI systems have subtle and system-specific effects at the single-cell level, generating single-cell-wide boundaries between CDI-expressing inhibitor cells and their neighboring targets. Despite the subtle effects of CDI at a single-cell level, CDI systems greatly diminished the ability of susceptible targets to expand their range during colony growth. The inoculum density of the population, together with the CDI system-specific variables of the speed of inhibition after contact and biological cost of CDI, strongly affects CDI-mediated competition. In contrast, the magnitude of the toxin-induced growth retardation of target cells only weakly impacts the composition of the population. Our work reveals how distinct CDI systems can differentially affect the composition and spatial arrangement of bacterial populations.

| S-EPMC6839403 | biostudies-literature

The mechano-chemical circuit drives skin organoid self-organization.

Project description:Stem cells in organoids self-organize into tissue patterns with unknown mechanisms. Here, we use skin organoids to analyze this process. Cell behavior videos show that the morphological transformation from multiple spheroidal units with morphogenesis competence (CMU) to planar skin is characterized by two abrupt cell motility-increasing events before calming down. The self-organizing processes are controlled by a morphogenetic module composed of molecular sensors, modulators, and executers. Increasing dermal stiffness provides the initial driving force (driver) which activates Yap1 (sensor) in epidermal cysts. Notch signaling (modulator 1) in epidermal cyst tunes the threshold of Yap1 activation. Activated Yap1 induces Wnts and MMPs (epidermal executers) in basal cells to facilitate cellular flows, allowing epidermal cells to protrude out from the CMU. Dermal cell-expressed Rock (dermal executer) generates a stiff force bridge between two CMU and accelerates tissue mixing via activating Laminin and β1-integrin. Thus, this self-organizing coalescence process is controlled by a mechano-chemical circuit. Beyond skin, self-organization in organoids may use similar mechano-chemical circuit structures.

| S-EPMC10483620 | biostudies-literature

Long-range electrothermal fluid motion in microfluidic systems.

Project description:AC electrothermal flow (ACEF) is the fluid motion created as a result of Joule heating induced temperature gradients. ACEF is capable of performing major microfluidic operations, such as pumping, mixing, concentration, separation and assay enhancement, and is effective in biological samples with a wide range of electrical conductivity. Here, we report long-range fluid motion induced by ACEF, which creates centimeter-scale vortices. The long-range fluid motion displays a strong voltage dependence and is suppressed in microchannels with a characteristic length below ~300 ?m. An extended computational model of ACEF, which considers the effects of the density gradient and temperature-dependent parameters, is developed and compared experimentally by particle image velocimetry. The model captures the essence of ACEF in a wide range of channel dimensions and operating conditions. The combined experimental and computational study reveals the essential roles of buoyancy, temperature rise, and associated changes in material properties in the formation of the long-range fluid motion. Our results provide critical information for the design and modeling of ACEF based microfluidic systems toward various bioanalytical applications.

| S-EPMC4843167 | biostudies-literature

Cryo-EM reveals the structural basis of long-range electron transport in a cytochrome-based bacterial nanowire.

Project description:Electrically conductive pili from Geobacter species, termed bacterial nanowires, are intensely studied for their biological significance and potential in the development of new materials. Using cryo-electron microscopy, we have characterized nanowires from conductive G. sulfurreducens pili preparations that are composed solely of head-to-tail stacked monomers of the six-heme C-type cytochrome OmcS. The unique fold of OmcS - closely wrapped around a continuous stack of hemes that can serve as an uninterrupted path for electron transport - generates a scaffold that supports the unbranched chain of hemes along the central axis of the filament. We present here, at 3.4 Å resolution, the structure of this cytochrome-based filament and discuss its possible role in long-range biological electron transport.

| S-EPMC6584659 | biostudies-literature

Geographic range of plants drives long-term climate change.

Project description:Long computation times in vegetation and climate models hamper our ability to evaluate the potentially powerful role of plants on weathering and carbon sequestration over the Phanerozoic Eon. Simulated vegetation over deep time is often homogenous, and disregards the spatial distribution of plants and the impact of local climatic variables on plant function. Here we couple a fast vegetation model (FLORA) to a spatially-resolved long-term climate-biogeochemical model (SCION), to assess links between plant geographical range, the long-term carbon cycle and climate. Model results show lower rates of carbon fixation and up to double the previously predicted atmospheric CO2 concentration due to a limited plant geographical range over the arid Pangea supercontinent. The Mesozoic dispersion of the continents increases modelled plant geographical range from 65% to > 90%, amplifying global CO2 removal, consistent with geological data. We demonstrate that plant geographical range likely exerted a major, under-explored control on long-term climate change.

| S-EPMC10901853 | biostudies-literature

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

OmicsDI is an Elixir interoperability service. Learn more ›

Tweets

OmicsDI Databases

PRIDE
PeptideAtlas
MassIVE
JPOST Repository
Physiome Model Repository

EGA
EVA
ENA
LINCS
PAXDB
Cell Collective

MetaboLights
Metabolomics Workbench
MetabolomeExpress
GNPS
BioModels
FAIRDOMHub

ArrayExpress
dbGaP
ExpressionAtlas
GEO
NODE

Information

Databases
Help
API
Contact us
Code on GitHub
Terms of use
Submit Data