Dresden 2017 – scientific programme

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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik

BP 26: Posters - Cell Adhesion

BP 26.2: Poster

Tuesday, March 21, 2017, 14:00–16:00, P2-EG

Revealing contact formation characteristics of bacteria — •Nicolas Thewes, Christian Spengler, Friederike Nolle, and Karin Jacobs — Experimental Physics, Saarland University, Germany

Bacteria exhibit an outstanding ability to adhere to various kinds of surfaces. Single cell AFM force spectroscopy has proven to be a powerful tool to quantify the acting forces if combined with a clever choice of substrates. On hydrophobic surfaces, the hydrophobic interaction plays the main role for the adhesion of bacteria and the contact formation process is dominated by the longest cell wall macromolecules. In our AFM study, we were able to observe the process of making contact by observing the snap-in process in detail [1]. To interpret the data, Monte Carlo simulations were set up, involving a simple model for a bacterium. The simulations yield strikingly matching results, corroborating the interpretation that the contact formation of S. aureus relies on thermally fluctuation cell wall proteins that tether to a surface and subsequently pull the bacterium to the surface. That way, e.g. S. aureus is able to attach to surfaces over distances far beyond the range of classic surface forces! Our results therefore suggest that the bacterial adhesion process in general, can be described by solely taking into account the tethered macromolecules between a bacterium and a surface.

[1] N. Thewes et al, Stochastic binding of Staphylococcus aureus to hydrophobic surfaces, Soft Matter 2015, 11, 8913 - 8919