Biofilms, bacterial communities formed on solid surfaces, are a predominant form of bacterial life on Earth. Biofilms are crucial for the environment, industry, and medicine. Biofilms can be beneficial, for example in the microbiome and in bioremediation, but biofilms can also be harmful, for example during infection and because biofilms foul many types of surfaces. Biofilm dispersal is crucial for bacterial spread and for disease transmission, but very little is known about this important process. One aim of this project is to determine the mechanisms that coordinate biofilm dispersal. Another aim of this project is to determine how communication between bacterial cells helps maintain biofilms. An exploration of the role of phages in driving biofilm formation and dispersal will also be a focus of this work This work will advance the progress of science by revealing the mechanisms that provide bacterial biofilms their resilience and they will reveal biofilm vulnerabilities. Highly talented students will be trained by working on this project. Efforts to increase diversity among those who participate in science research and efforts to expand public access/public understanding of science are central to the project and will be accomplished through a variety of nation-wide science outreach efforts.
The overall goals of this research are to explore the mechanics, spatial and temporal cell-cell communication processes, and signal transduction networks that enable bacteria to build and subsequently disassemble multicellular biofilm communities. An exploration of the role of phages in driving biofilm formation and dispersal will be a focus. The studies will span biological scales - from the molecule, to the protein, to the network, to the cell, to the community. At a basic science level, the work will define the mechanisms bacteria use to uniquely detect and respond to kin and non-kin in communities, how genes and mechanics interact to drive community morphology, and how inter-domain interactions influence multicellular community dynamics. At a practical level, these investigations could lead to synthetic strategies to manipulate biofilm formation and dispersal, quorum-sensing-mediated communication, and phage infection of bacteria. Consequently, the results should reveal the principles underpinning the evolution and maintenance of traits that are not essential under laboratory conditions but are crucial and precisely regulated in nature. With this knowledge in hand, the field should be able to rapidly move forward to develop synthetic strategies to prevent or promote quorum sensing, to prevent or promote single-species and mixed-species biofilm formation, and to prevent or promote biofilm dispersal, as required. Such applications will have industrial, agricultural, and medical relevance. The PI is highly involved in service as Chair of Department, as a teacher, as an editor, broadly in national educational and outreach initiatives, and through her service to not-for-profit foundations and government funding agencies.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
