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Molecular communication promises to enable communication between nanomachines with a view to increasing their functionalities and open up new possible applications. Due to some of the biological properties, bacteria have been proposed as a…

The random energy landscapes developed by speckle fields can be used to confine and manipulate a large number of micro-particles with a single laser beam. By means of molecular dynamics simulations, we investigate the static and dynamic…

Risk spreading in bacterial populations is generally regarded as a strategy to maximize survival. Here, we study its role during range expansion of a genetically diverse population where growth and motility are two alternative traits. We…

Transport at small scales is classically understood within an equilibrium framework, where dispersion theory successfully describes shear-enhanced diffusion for passive particles in the continuum limit. However, as most bacteria can move on…

One approach to quantifying biological diversity consists of characterizing the statistical distribution of specific properties of a taxonomic group or habitat. Microorganisms living in fluid environments, and for whom motility is key,…

We experimentally investigate how aerotactic bacteria, confined within a thin liquid film between two solid substrates, respond to a controlled oxygen gradient. We find that the total bacterial number density dictates which mechanism…

Conjugation is the primary mechanism of horizontal gene transfer that spreads antibiotic resistance among bacteria. Although conjugation normally occurs in surface-associated growth (e.g., biofilms), it has been traditionally studied in…

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,…

Dense bacterial suspensions at fluid interfaces provide a natural platform to explore active turbulence in a dimensional mismatch: active units are restricted to a two-dimensional surface, while the induced flows extend into the surrounding…

The evaporation of a tiny amount of water on the solid surface with different wettability has been studied by molecular dynamics simulations. We found that, as the surface changed from hydrophobicity to hydrophility, the evaporation speed…

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…

In nature, microorganisms must often cope with hostile environmental conditions. To do so they have developed sophisticated cooperative behavior and intricate communication capabilities, such as: direct cell-cell physical interactions via…

We show that the recent experimental observation of the rectification of swimming bacteria in a system with an array of asymmetric barriers occurs due to the ballistic component of the bacteria trajectories introduced by the bacterial…

Swimming bacteria create long-range velocity fields that stir a large volume of fluid and move around passive particles dispersed in the fluid. Recent experiments and simulations have shown that long-time mean-squared displacement of…

The self-organization of microbial ecosystems involves a large variety of mechanisms, ranging from biochemical signaling to population dynamics. Among these, the role of motility regulation has been little studied, despite the importance of…

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…

A flagellated bacterium navigates fluid environments by rotating its helical flagellar bundle. The wobbling of the bacterial body significantly influences its swimming behavior. To quantify the three underlying motions--precession,…

Bacteria invade surfaces by forming dense colonies encased in a polymer matrix. Successful settlement of founder bacteria, early microcolony development and later macroscopic spreading of these biofilms on surfaces rely on complex physical…

It is well known that flagellated bacteria swim in circles near surfaces. However, recent experiments have shown that a sulfide-oxidizing bacterium named Thiovulum majus can transition from swimming in circles to a surface bound state where…

Understanding how the physical properties of a fluid influence bacterial behavior is essential for explaining how microorganisms interact with their environment and with animal hosts. Here, we examine how changes in fluid viscosity and…