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It is pretty well known in literature, that bacteria have certain so-called chemotaxis receptors [http://2008.igem.org/Team:Heidelberg/Project/Sensing] on their surface. These receptors are, in nature, used for recognizing attractand molecules (nutrition, i.e. sugar) or repellents (i.e. toxic molecules). | It is pretty well known in literature, that bacteria have certain so-called chemotaxis receptors [http://2008.igem.org/Team:Heidelberg/Project/Sensing] on their surface. These receptors are, in nature, used for recognizing attractand molecules (nutrition, i.e. sugar) or repellents (i.e. toxic molecules). | ||
It is possible to influence (I would not say control, but at least strongly influence) the direction in that bacterial colonies on an agar plate swim by putting repellent and attractand molecules at different points on the plate. To give you one example: If I would put aspartate in the middle of an agar plate with E. coli colonies on it, the E. coli would move in direction of the aspartate. Their are different E. coli strains, that do contain different or even no receptors. Find a comparisn of swimming and not-swimming bacteria [http://parts.mit.edu/igem07/images/f/f3/SwarmingPic.jpg here]. | It is possible to influence (I would not say control, but at least strongly influence) the direction in that bacterial colonies on an agar plate swim by putting repellent and attractand molecules at different points on the plate. To give you one example: If I would put aspartate in the middle of an agar plate with E. coli colonies on it, the E. coli would move in direction of the aspartate. Their are different E. coli strains, that do contain different or even no receptors. Find a comparisn of swimming and not-swimming bacteria [http://parts.mit.edu/igem07/images/f/f3/SwarmingPic.jpg here]. | ||
In general that could be interesting if you wanted to make bacteria swim toward each other. To give you an impression on what swimming bacteria on a plate would look like, find some examples I took from my bachelor thesis [[Bacheloararbeit_Dominik_Niopek_druck.pdf | In general that could be interesting if you wanted to make bacteria swim toward each other. To give you an impression on what swimming bacteria on a plate would look like, find some examples I took from my bachelor thesis here[[Bacheloararbeit_Dominik_Niopek_druck.pdf]] | ||
====Go with the flow==== | ====Go with the flow==== | ||