Biophysical Society Thematic Meeting| Aussois 2019

Biology and Physics Confront Cell-Cell Adhesion

Poster Abstracts

22-POS Board 22 MORPHOGENESIS AND PATTERNING OF BACTERIAL ASSEMBLIES VIA OPTOGENETIC AND SYNTHETIC CELL-CELL ADHESINS Ingmar H. Riedel-Kruse 1,2 ; David Glass 1 ; Xiaofan Jin 1 ; Honesty J Kim 1 ; 1 Stanford University, Bioengineering, Stanford, CA, USA 2 University of Arizona, Molecular and Cell Biology, Tucson, AZ, USA Optogenetics and synthetic biology have been highly successful in engineering and studying various biological systems, but applications to investigating cell-cell adhesion have been lacking. My lab recently developed the first 100% genetically encoded synthetic platform for modular cell-cell adhesion in bacteria utilizing nano-bodies (Glass, Cell 2018), furthermore the first optogenetic control for high-resolution biofilm cell-cell and cell-surface adhesion (biofilm lithography) (Jin, PNAS 2018). Here I will discuss soon-to-be published results utilizing these new methods: (1) We quantitatively pattern multi-strain biofilms, and we observe how cell-cell adhesion fosters multi-species cooperation and shared anti-biotic protection under various bacterial antibiotic loads. (2) We show how cell-cell adhesion mediates sharp, macroscopic boundaries between different bacterial populations that encounter each other; a supporting biophysical model provides deeper quantitative insights regarding a patterning transition. (3) I will give a perspective on future opportunities regarding synthetic adhesins for eukaryotes, the construction of living self-assembly biomaterials, and the engineering of synthetic multi- cellular life. In conclusion, synthetic cell-cell adhesins provide a new approach to study cell adhesion and multi-cellular patterning and morphogenesis.

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