Bulletin of the American Physical Society
APS March Meeting 2023
Volume 68, Number 3
Las Vegas, Nevada (March 5-10)
Virtual (March 20-22); Time Zone: Pacific Time
Session W06: Bacterial Communities II
3:00 PM–5:48 PM,
Thursday, March 9, 2023
Room: Room 129
Sponsoring
Unit:
DBIO
Chair: Jay Tang, Brown University
Abstract: W06.00010 : Substrate stiffness impacts early biofilm formation by modulating twitching motility*
5:12 PM–5:24 PM
Presenter:
sigolene Lecuyer
(ENS Lyon - Physics department)
Authors:
sigolene Lecuyer
(ENS Lyon - Physics department)
Delphine Débarre
(LIPhy/CNRS)
Sofia Gomez Ho
(LIPhy/CNRS)
Karin John
(LIPhy/CNRS)
Lionel Bureau
(LIPhy/CNRS)
We embed hydrogel substrates of tunable rigidity in microfluidic channels, and image adhering bacteria in situ under constant flow, until colony formation. Our experiments show a strong dependence of colony phenotype on the underlying substrate stiffness. On soft hydrogels, P. aeruginosa assembles into dense hemispherical colonies, while on stiffer substrates it forms thin spread-out colonies. By tracking individual bacteria, we show that this difference in bacterial organization derives from a difference in bacterial surface motility. We propose a simple mechanistic model for the function of type-4 pili (T4P) on a deformable substrate, that accounts for the observed results. Finally, we show that this modulation of twitching motility by substrate stiffness can have far-reaching consequences for the biofilm, e.g. regarding EPS distribution or gene regulation.
*This work was supported by the French National Research Agency (grant ANR-19-CE42-0010), and LabeX Tec 21 at University Grenoble-Alpes (ANR-11-LABX-0030).
Follow Us |
Engage
Become an APS Member |
My APS
Renew Membership |
Information for |
About APSThe American Physical Society (APS) is a non-profit membership organization working to advance the knowledge of physics. |
© 2024 American Physical Society
| All rights reserved | Terms of Use
| Contact Us
Headquarters
1 Physics Ellipse, College Park, MD 20740-3844
(301) 209-3200
Editorial Office
100 Motor Pkwy, Suite 110, Hauppauge, NY 11788
(631) 591-4000
Office of Public Affairs
529 14th St NW, Suite 1050, Washington, D.C. 20045-2001
(202) 662-8700