Journal
MBIO
Volume 8, Issue 1, Pages -Publisher
AMER SOC MICROBIOLOGY
DOI: 10.1128/mBio.02102-16
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Funding
- Research Unit [UMR8261]
- Initiative d'Excellence program from the French State [DYNAMO ANR-11-LABX-0011]
- Lebanese Council for Scientific Research (CNRS-L)
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Bacteria adopt social behavior to expand into new territory, led by specialized swarmers, before forming a biofilm. Such mass migration of Bacillus subtilis on a synthetic medium produces hyperbranching dendrites that transiently (equivalent to 4 to 5 generations of growth) maintain a cellular monolayer over long distances, greatly facilitating single-cell gene expression analysis. Paradoxically, while cells in the dendrites (nonswarmers) might be expected to grow exponentially, the rate of swarm expansion is constant, suggesting that some cells are not multiplying. Little attention has been paid to which cells in a swarm are actually multiplying and contributing to the overall biomass. Here, we show in situ that DNA replication, protein translation and peptidoglycan synthesis are primarily restricted to the swarmer cells at dendrite tips. Thus, these specialized cells not only lead the population forward but are apparently the source of all cells in the stems of early dendrites. We developed a simple mathematical model that supports this conclusion.
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