Biofilm assembly becomes crystal clear – filamentous bacteriophage organize the Pseudomonas aeruginosa biofilm matrix into a liquid crystal
Authors:Patrick R. Secor1, Laura K. Jennings1, Lia A. Michaels1, Johanna M. Sweere2, Pradeep K. Singh1, William C. Parks3, Paul L. Bollyky2
1 Department of Microbiology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA.
2 Department of Medicine, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA.
3 Department of Medicine, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
Keywords:
biofilm, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, filamentous bacteriophage, chronic infection, cystic fibrosis, liquid crystal, soft matter physics.
Related Article(s)?
Secor PR, Sweere JM, Michaels LA, Malkovskiy AV, Lazzareschi D, Katznelson E, Arrigoni A, Braun KR, Evanko SP, Kaminsky W, Singh PK, Parks WC, Bollyky PL (2015). Filamentous bacteriophage promote biofilm assembly and function. Cell Host & Microbe 18:549-59. , 10.1016/j.chom.2015.10.013
Corresponding Author(s):
Conflict of interest statement:
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Please cite this article as:
Patrick R. Secor, Laura K. Jennings, Lia A. Michaels, Johanna M. Sweere, Pradeep K. Singh, William C. Parks, Paul L. Bollyky (2015). Biofilm assembly becomes crystal clear – Filamentous bacteriophage organize the Pseudomonas aeruginosa biofilm matrix into a liquid crystal. Microbial Cell 3(1): 49-52. doi: 10.15698/mic2016.01.475
© 2015 Secor et al. This is an open-access article released under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license, which allows the unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are acknowledged.
Abstract:
Pseudomonas aeruginosa is an opportunistic bacterial pathogen associated with many types of chronic infection. At sites of chronic infection, such as the airways of people with cystic fibrosis (CF), P. aeruginosa forms biofilm-like aggregates. These are clusters of bacterial cells encased in a polymer-rich matrix that shields bacteria from environmental stresses and antibiotic treatment. When P. aeruginosa forms a biofilm, large amounts of filamentous Pf bacteriophage (phage) are produced. Unlike most phage that typically lyse and kill their bacterial hosts, filamentous phage of the genus Inovirus, which includes Pf phage, often do not, and instead are continuously extruded from the bacteria. Here, we discuss the implications of the accumulation of filamentous Pf phage in the biofilm matrix, where they interact with matrix polymers to organize the biofilm into a highly ordered liquid crystal. This structural configuration promotes bacterial adhesion, desiccation survival, and antibiotic tolerance – all features typically associated with biofilms. We propose that Pf phage make structural contributions to P. aeruginosa biofilms and that this constitutes a novel form of symbiosis between bacteria and bacteriophage.
doi: 10.15698/mic2016.01.475
Volume 3, pp. 49 to 52, published 31/12/2015.