Journal
SCIENTIFIC REPORTS
Volume 8, Issue -, Pages -Publisher
NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-34192-2
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Funding
- NIH [R35GM118085]
- Welch grant [F-1811]
- EU/FP7 REA grant [321777]
- Israel Science Foundation [373/16, 337/12]
- Roy J. Zuckerberg Career Development Chair for Water Research
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Swarming bacteria are an example of a complex, active biological system, where high cell density and super-diffusive cell mobility confer survival advantages to the group as a whole. Previous studies on the dynamics of the swarm have been limited to easily observable regions at the advancing edge of the swarm where cells are restricted to a plane. In this study, using defocused epifluorescence video imaging, we have tracked the motion of fluorescently labeled individuals within the interior of a densely packed three-dimensional (3D) region of a swarm. Our analysis reveals a novel 3D architecture, where bacteria are constrained by inter-particle interactions, sandwiched between two distinct boundary conditions. We find that secreted biosurfactants keep bacteria away from the swarm-air upper boundary, and added antibiotics at the lower swarm-surface boundary lead to their migration away from this boundary. Formation of the antibiotic-avoidance zone is dependent on a functional chemotaxis signaling system, in the absence of which the swarm loses its high tolerance to the antibiotics.
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