Related papers: Biofilm growth on rugose surfaces
In many growth processes particles are highly mobile in an active layer at the surface, but are relatively immobile once incorporated in the bulk. We study models in which atoms are allowed to interact, equilibrate, and order on the…
Bacteria build multicellular communities termed biofilms, which are often encased in a self-secreted extracellular matrix that gives the community mechanical strength and protection against harsh chemicals. How bacteria assemble distinct…
The spreading of bacterial colonies at solid-air interfaces is determined by the physico-chemical properties of the involved interfaces. The production of surfactant molecules by bacteria is a widespread strategy that allows the colony to…
Surface growth, by association or dissociation of material on the boundaries of a body, is ubiquitous in both natural and engineering systems. It is the fundamental mechanism by which biological materials grow, starting from the level of a…
When planktonic bacteria adhere together to a surface, they begin to form biofilms, or communities of bacteria. Biofilm formation in a host can be extremely problematic if left untreated, especially since antibiotics can be ineffective in…
Biological active materials such as bacterial biofilms and eukaryotic cells thrive in confined micro-spaces. Here, we show through numerical simulations that confinement can serve as a mechanical guidance to achieve distinct modes of…
The coarsening dynamics of three-dimensional islands on a growing film is discussed. It is assumed that the origin of the initial instability of a planar surface is the Ehrlich-Schwoebel step-edge barrier for adatom diffusion. Two…
Two-dimensional simulations are used to explore topological transitions that occur during the formation of films grown from grains that are seeded on substrates. This is done for a relatively large range of the initial value $\Phi_s$ of the…
A method combining video imaging in parallel microchannels with a semi-empirical mathematical model provides non-intrusive, high-throughput measurements of time-varying biofilm viscosity. The approach is demonstrated for early growth…
We introduce various models for cellulose bio-degradation by micro-organisms. Those models rely on complex chemical mechanisms, involve the structure of the cellulose chains and are allowed to depend on the phenotypical traits of the…
One of the principal mechanisms by which surfaces and interfaces affect microbial life is by perturbing the hydrodynamic flows generated by swimming. By summing a recursive series of image systems we derive a numerically tractable…
Biofilm growth and transport in confined systems frequently occur in natural and engineered systems. Designing customizable engineered porous materials for controllable biofilm transportation properties could significantly improve the rapid…
Controlling and suppressing bacterial accumulation at solid surfaces is essential for preventing biofilm formation and biofouling. Whereas various chemical surface treatments are known to reduce cell accumulation and attachment, the role of…
A biofilm is a microbial city. It consists of bacteria embedded in an extracellular polymeric substance (EPS) that functions as a protective barrier. Quorum sensing (QS) is a method of bacterial communication, where autoinducers (AIs)…
The understanding of morphogenesis in living organisms has been renewed by tremendous progressin experimental techniques that provide access to cell-scale, quantitative information both on theshapes of cells within tissues and on the genes…
Dormancy is an essential strategy for microorganisms to cope with environmental stress. However, global ecosystem models typically ignore microbial dormancy, resulting in major model uncertainties. To facilitate the consideration of…
The generation of anisotropic shapes occurs during morphogenesis of almost all organisms. With the recent renewal of the interest in mechanical aspects of morphogenesis, it has become clear that mechanics contributes to anisotropic forms in…
Thin film growth is investigated in two types of lattice gas models where substrate and film particles are different, expressed by unequal interaction energy parameters. The first is of solid-on-solid type, whereas the second type…
The formation of mounded surfaces in epitaxial growth is attributed to the presence of barriers against interlayer diffusion in the terrace edges, known as Ehrlich-Schwoebel (ES) barriers. We investigate a model for epitaxial growth using a…
A variational model for epitaxially-strained thin films on rigid substrates is derived both by {\Gamma}-convergence from a transition-layer setting, and by relaxation from a sharp-interface description available in the literature for…