Related papers: Substrate geometry affects population dynamics in …
Biofilms are communities of microorganisms that grow on virtually all surfaces with sufficient nutrients including aquatic and industrial water systems and medical devices. Biofilms are complex, structured communities where the interplay of…
Biological evolution of a population is governed by the fitness landscape, which is a map from genotype to fitness. However, a fitness landscape depends on the organisms environment, and evolution in changing environments is still poorly…
Biofilm accumulation in the porous media can cause plugging and change many physical properties of porous media. Targeted bioplugging may have significant applications for industrial processes. A deeper understanding of the relative…
Bacterial biofilms cost an enormous amount of resources in the health, medical, and industrial sectors. To understand early biofilm formation, beginning from planktonic states of active bacterial suspensions (such as Escherichia coli) to…
We propose a general parametrizable model to capture the dynamic interaction among bacteria in the formation of micro-colonies. micro-colonies represent the first social step towards the formation of structured multicellular communities…
Segregation of populations is a key question in evolution theory. One important aspect is the relation between spatial organization and the population's composition. Here we study a specific example -- sectors in expanding bacterial…
Bacteria commonly inhabit porous environments such as host tissues, soil, and marine sediments, where complex geometries constrain and redirect their motion. Although bacterial motility has been studied in porous media, the roles of cell…
We study colonies of non-motile, rod-shaped bacteria growing on solid substrates. In our model, bacteria interact purely mechanically, by pushing each other away as they grow, and consume a diffusing nutrient. We show that mechanical…
Bacteria can adjust the structure of colonies and biofilms to enhance their survival rate under external stress. Here, we explore the link between bacterial interaction forces and colony structure. We show that the activity of extracellular…
Bacteria are ubiquitous in our daily lives, either as motile planktonic cells or as immobilized surface-attached biofilms. These different phenotypic states play key roles in agriculture, environment, industry, and medicine; hence, it is…
Biofilms in porous media critically influence hydraulic properties in environmental and engineered systems. However, a mechanistic understanding of how microbial life controls permeability remains elusive. By combining microfluidics,…
We derive a physiologically structured multiscale model for biofilm development. The model has components on two spatial scales, which induce different time scales into the problem. The macroscopic behavior of the system is modeled using…
Many organisms form colonies for a transient period of time to withstand environmental pressure. Bacterial biofilms are a prototypical example of such behavior. Despite significant interest across disciplines, physical mechanisms governing…
Bacteria in biofilms form complex structures and can collectively migrate within mobile aggregates, which is referred to as swarming. This behavior is influenced by a combination of various factors, including morphological characteristics…
The dynamics of growth of bacterial populations has been extensively studied for planktonic cells in well-agitated liquid culture, in which all cells have equal access to nutrients. In the real world, bacteria are more likely to live in…
Biofilms pose significant problems for engineers in diverse fields, such as marine science, bioenergy, and biomedicine, where effective biofilm control is a long-term goal. The adhesion and surface mechanics of biofilms play crucial roles…
Bacterial colonies growing on surfaces are shaped by mechanical stresses transmitted through the community, governed by the balance between cell growth and steric and cell-substrate interactions. Using overdamped dynamics simulations of…
Bioconvection, a phenomenon arising from the collective motion of motile microorganisms, plays a crucial role in shaping microbial distributions, fluid dynamics, and bloom formation in aquatic environments. While extensive research has…
This study explores the application of elongated particle interaction models, traditionally used in liquid crystal phase research, in the context of early bacterial biofilm development. Through computer simulations using an agent-based…
Colonies of bacteria grown on thin agar plate exhibit fractal patterns as a result of adaptation to their environments. The bacterial colony pattern formation is regulated crucially by chemotaxis, the movement of cells along a chemical…