Nonuniversality of front fluctuations for compact colonies of nonmotile bacteria

Silvia N. Santalla, Javier Rodríguez-Laguna, José P. Abad, Irma Marín, María del Mar Espinosa, Javier Muñoz-García, Luis Vázquez, and Rodolfo Cuerno
Phys. Rev. E 98, 012407 – Published 10 July 2018

Abstract

The front of a compact bacterial colony growing on a Petri dish is a paradigmatic instance of non-equilibrium fluctuations in the celebrated Eden, or Kardar-Parisi-Zhang (KPZ), universality class. While in many experiments the scaling exponents crucially differ from the expected KPZ values, the source of this disagreement has remained poorly understood. We have performed growth experiments with B. subtilis 168 and E. coli ATCC 25922 under conditions leading to compact colonies in the classically alleged Eden regime, where individual motility is suppressed. Non-KPZ scaling is indeed observed for all accessible times, KPZ asymptotics being ruled out for our experiments due to the monotonic increase of front branching with time. Simulations of an effective model suggest the occurrence of transient nonuniversal scaling due to diffusive morphological instabilities, agreeing with expectations from detailed models of the relevant biological reaction-diffusion processes.

  • Figure
  • Figure
  • Figure
  • Figure
  • Figure
  • Figure
  • Figure
4 More
  • Received 14 February 2017
  • Revised 19 June 2018

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.98.012407

©2018 American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Statistical Physics & ThermodynamicsPhysics of Living Systems

Authors & Affiliations

Silvia N. Santalla1, Javier Rodríguez-Laguna2, José P. Abad3, Irma Marín3, María del Mar Espinosa4, Javier Muñoz-García5, Luis Vázquez6, and Rodolfo Cuerno5

  • 1Departamento de Física and Grupo Interdisciplinar de Sistemas Complejos (GISC), Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, Leganés, Spain
  • 2Departamento de Física Fundamental, Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED), Madrid, Spain
  • 3Departamento de Biología Molecular, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (UAM), Cantoblanco, Madrid, Spain
  • 4Hospital Universitario Puerta de Hierro, Madrid, Spain
  • 5Departamento de Matemáticas & GISC, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, Leganés, Spain
  • 6Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales de Madrid (ICMM), Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientficas (CSIC), Madrid, Spain

Article Text (Subscription Required)

Click to Expand

References (Subscription Required)

Click to Expand
Issue

Vol. 98, Iss. 1 — July 2018

Reuse & Permissions
Access Options
Author publication services for translation and copyediting assistance advertisement

Authorization Required


×
×

Images

×

Sign up to receive regular email alerts from Physical Review E

Log In

Cancel
×

Search


Article Lookup

Paste a citation or DOI

Enter a citation
×