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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik
BP 20: Poster IIIa
BP 20.7: Poster
Wednesday, March 20, 2024, 11:00–14:30, Poster B
Evaluating the cell-cell interactions of swimming flagellated microbes — •Henrik Groh1, Alexandros A. Fragkopoulos1, Colin-Marius Koch2, Michael Wilczek2, and Oliver Bäumchen1 — 1University of Bayreuth, Experimental Physics V, 95447 Bayreuth, Germany — 2University of Bayreuth, Theoretical Physics I, 95447 Bayreuth, Germany
In suspensions of living microorganisms individual cells often interact leading to larger-scale emergent effects. Such collective phenomena are studied more extensively than the single-cell behaviour and the interactions that lead to the overall effect. However, understanding their mutual interactions is necessary to fully understand the emergence of their collective behaviour. For example, the aggregation of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, a swimming unicellular microbe, in the presence of self-generated oxygen gradients has been investigated [1], but the cell-cell interactions in this system have yet to be explored. Here, we investigate the mutual interactions of microswimmers in a quasi-2D suspension of C. reinhardtii with high temporal and spatial resolution. This involves the determination of an effective potential between two cells via the relationship between the incoming and outgoing cell motility of a collision event. A particular challenge in this context is to identify the influence of the flagella on the contact process. With our investigations we gain more detailed insights into the swimming behavior of C. reinhardtii and, thus, better understand their population-level properties.
[ 1] A.A. Fragkopoulos et al., J. R. Soc. Interface 18, 20210553 (2021).
Keywords: cell-cell interactions; microswimmers; Chlamydomonas reinhardtii