Numerous ecological interactions among microbes—for example, competition for space and resources, or interaction among phages and their bacterial hosts—are likely to occur simultaneously in multispecies biofilm communities. While biofilms formed by just a single species occur, multispecies biofilms are thought to be more typical of microbial communities in the natural environment. Previous work has shown that multispecies biofilms can increase, decrease, or have no measurable impact on phage exposure of a host bacterium living alongside another species that the phages cannot target. The reasons underlying this variability are not well understood, and how phage–host encounters change within multispecies biofilms remains mostly unexplored at the cellular spatial scale. Here, we study how the cellular scale architecture of model 2-species biofilms impacts cell–cell and cell–phage interactions controlling larger scale population and community dynamics. Our system consists of dual culture biofilms of
Variation in the ratio of curli and phosphoethanolamine cellulose associated with biofilm architecture and properties
Bacterial biofilms are communities of bacteria entangled in a self‐produced extracellular matrix (ECM).
- Award ID(s):
- 2001189
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10454315
- Publisher / Repository:
- Wiley Blackwell (John Wiley & Sons)
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Biopolymers
- Volume:
- 112
- Issue:
- 1
- ISSN:
- 0006-3525
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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