🦠 "Rush hour on Agar Avenue."

Swarming motility of the bacteria on solid Agar substrate within 24hrs. Swarming behavior in the colony is recognised by the branching structures of cells moving in the same direction.

Our bachelor student Franz has recorded his first exciting movie with swarming bacteria. He along with our PhD student Jasmin, is using Cell-Tracking to investigate the motility and phase separation behaviour of the soil-dwelling bacterium Myxococcus xanthus 🧫 under starvation conditions. These starved bacteria colony form Fruiting bodies that can be described as a phase separation driven by changes in motility of the bacteria. Building on similar experiments Franz aims to improve the imaging process and stability for further analysis.