Mechanical forces drive a reorientation cascade leading to biofilm self-patterning.

ABSTRACT: In growing active matter systems, a large collection of engineered or living autonomous units metabolize free energy and create order at different length scales as they proliferate and migrate collectively. One such example is bacterial biofilms, surface-attached aggregates of bacterial cells embedded in an extracellular matrix that can exhibit community-scale orientational order. However, how bacterial growth coordinates with cell-surface interactions to create distinctive, long-range order during biofilm development remains elusive. Here we report a collective cell reorientation cascade in growing Vibrio cholerae biofilms that leads to a differentially ordered, spatiotemporally coupled core-rim structure reminiscent of a blooming aster. Cell verticalization in the core leads to a pattern

SUBMITTER: Nijjer J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8599862 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature