Related papers: Nascent biofilms on soft surfaces
Immotile microbes inhabit nearly every environment on Earth, from soils and sediments to food matrices -- yet how they disperse through these physically confining environments is poorly understood. Here, we show that immotile microbial…
Cells in tissues can organize into a broad spectrum of structures according to their function. Drastic changes of organization, such as epithelial-mesenchymal transitions or the formation of spheroidal aggregates, are often associated…
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…
In this work we consider how surface-adherent bacterial biofilm communities respond in flowing systems. We simulate the fluid-structure interaction and separation process using the immersed boundary method. In these simulations we model and…
We investigate morphologies of proliferating cellular tissues using a newly developed numerical simulation model for mechanical cell division and migration in 2D. The model is applied to a bimodal mixture consisting of stiff cells with a…
Anaerobic processes (e.g., methanogenesis and fermentation) largely contribute to element cycling and natural contaminant attenuation/mobilization, even in well-oxygenated porous environments, such as shallow aquifers. This paradox is…
A hydrodynamic model is proposed to describe one of the most critical problems in intensive medical care units: the formation of biofilms inside central venous catheters. The incorporation of approximate solutions for the flow-limited…
Tissue growth kinetics and interface dynamics depend on the properties of the tissue environment and cell-cell interactions. In cellular environments, substrate heterogeneity and geometry arise from a variety factors, such as the structure…
A thin liquid film with non-zero curvature at its free surface spontaneously flows to reach a flat configuration, a process driven by Laplace pressure gradients and resisted by the liquid's viscosity. Inspired by recent progresses on the…
Biomolecular condensates help organize the cell cytoplasm and nucleoplasm into spatial compartments with different chemical compositions. A key feature of such compositional patterning is the local enrichment of enzymatically active…
The striking variety of macroscopic morphologies displayed by bacterial colonies depends on microscopic environmental and behavioural details in a manner that is currently not well understood. A surprising example is sibling inhibition,…
Adhering cells actively probe the mechanical properties of their environment and use the resulting information to position and orient themselves. We show that a large body of experimental observations can be consistently explained from one…
Elastic active matter or active solid consists of self-propelled units embedded in an elastic matrix. Active solid resists deformation; the shape-preserving property and the intrinsic non-equilibrium nature make active solids a superior…
Cells swimming in confined environments are attracted by surfaces. We measure the steady-state distribution of smooth-swimming bacteria (Escherichia coli) between two glass plates. In agreement with earlier studies, we find a strong…
Hypothesis: Bacterial contamination of surfaces poses a major threat to public health. Designing effective antibacterial or self-cleaning surfaces requires understanding how bacteria-laden droplets interact with solid substrates and how…
We address the folding induced by differential growth in soft layered solids via an elementary model that consists of a soft growing neo-Hookean elastic layer adhered to a deep elastic substrate. As the layer/substrate modulus ratio is…
Thin film coatings have been essential in development of several micro and nano-scale devices. To realize thin film coatings various deposition techniques are employed, each yielding surface morphologies with different characteristics of…
Biological cells are able to adapt their behaviour in response to environmental cues. Durotaxis is a phenomenon in which cells adjust their migration depending on the mechanical properties of a surrounding substrate. Although durotaxis has…
As antibiotic resistance continues to pose a significant threat to public health, alternative treatments are urgently needed. Phage therapy, which utilizes bacteriophages to specifically target bacterial pathogens, has emerged as a…
Functionality of living cells is inherently linked to subunits with dimensions on the nanoscale. In case of osteoblasts the cell surface plays a particularly important role for adhesion and spreading which are crucial properties with regard…