TY - JOUR
T1 - Chemotactic migration of bacteria in porous media
AU - Bhattacharjee, Tapomoy
AU - Amchin, Daniel B.
AU - Ott, Jenna A.
AU - Kratz, Felix
AU - Datta, Sujit S.
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported by National Science Foundation (NSF) grant CBET-1941716 , the Project X Innovation fund , a distinguished postdoctoral fellowship from the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment at Princeton University to T.B., support from the Keller Center REACH program for F.K., the Eric and Wendy Schmidt Transformative Technology Fund at Princeton, the Princeton Catalysis Initiative, and in part by funding from the Princeton Center for Complex Materials , a Materials Research Science and Engineering Center supported by NSF grant DMR-2011750 . This material is also based upon work supported by the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (to J.A.O.) under grant no. DGE-1656466 . Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF. The experimental platform used to 3D print and image bacterial communities in this publication is the subject of a patent application filed by Princeton University on behalf of T.B. and S.S.D.
Funding Information:
We acknowledge Tommy Angelini for providing microgel polymers; Average Phan and Bob Austin for providing fluorescent E. coli; the Stone lab for use of the Anton-Paar rheometer; and Ricard Alert, Bob Austin, Mohamed Donia, Zemer Gitai, Yannis Kevrekidis, Jasmine Nirody, Josh Shaevitz, Howard Stone, Sankaran Sundaresan, and Ned Wingreen for stimulating discussions. This work was supported by National Science Foundation (NSF) grant CBET-1941716, the Project X Innovation fund, a distinguished postdoctoral fellowship from the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment at Princeton University to T.B. support from the Keller Center REACH program for F.K. the Eric and Wendy Schmidt Transformative Technology Fund at Princeton, the Princeton Catalysis Initiative, and in part by funding from the Princeton Center for Complex Materials, a Materials Research Science and Engineering Center supported by NSF grant DMR-2011750. This material is also based upon work supported by the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (to J.A.O.) under grant no. DGE-1656466. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF. The experimental platform used to 3D print and image bacterial communities in this publication is the subject of a patent application filed by Princeton University on behalf of T.B. and S.S.D.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Biophysical Society
PY - 2021/8/17
Y1 - 2021/8/17
N2 - Chemotactic migration of bacteria—their ability to direct multicellular motion along chemical gradients—is central to processes in agriculture, the environment, and medicine. However, current understanding of migration is based on studies performed in bulk liquid, despite the fact that many bacteria inhabit tight porous media such as soils, sediments, and biological gels. Here, we directly visualize the chemotactic migration of Escherichia coli populations in well-defined 3D porous media in the absence of any other imposed external forcing (e.g., flow). We find that pore-scale confinement is a strong regulator of migration. Strikingly, cells use a different primary mechanism to direct their motion in confinement than in bulk liquid. Furthermore, confinement markedly alters the dynamics and morphology of the migrating population—features that can be described by a continuum model, but only when standard motility parameters are substantially altered from their bulk liquid values to reflect the influence of pore-scale confinement. Our work thus provides a framework to predict and control the migration of bacteria, and active matter in general, in complex environments.
AB - Chemotactic migration of bacteria—their ability to direct multicellular motion along chemical gradients—is central to processes in agriculture, the environment, and medicine. However, current understanding of migration is based on studies performed in bulk liquid, despite the fact that many bacteria inhabit tight porous media such as soils, sediments, and biological gels. Here, we directly visualize the chemotactic migration of Escherichia coli populations in well-defined 3D porous media in the absence of any other imposed external forcing (e.g., flow). We find that pore-scale confinement is a strong regulator of migration. Strikingly, cells use a different primary mechanism to direct their motion in confinement than in bulk liquid. Furthermore, confinement markedly alters the dynamics and morphology of the migrating population—features that can be described by a continuum model, but only when standard motility parameters are substantially altered from their bulk liquid values to reflect the influence of pore-scale confinement. Our work thus provides a framework to predict and control the migration of bacteria, and active matter in general, in complex environments.
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U2 - 10.1016/j.bpj.2021.05.012
DO - 10.1016/j.bpj.2021.05.012
M3 - Article
C2 - 34022238
AN - SCOPUS:85109031845
SN - 0006-3495
VL - 120
SP - 3483
EP - 3497
JO - Biophysical Journal
JF - Biophysical Journal
IS - 16
ER -