Swimming behavior of Pseudomonas aeruginosa studied by holographic 3D tracking

Svenja M Vater; Sebastian Weiße; Stojan Maleschlijski; Carmen Lotz; Florian Koschitzki; Thomas Schwartz; Ursula Obst; Axel Rosenhahn

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0087765

Swimming behavior of Pseudomonas aeruginosa studied by holographic 3D tracking

PLoS One. 2014 Jan 31;9(1):e87765. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0087765. eCollection 2014.

Authors

Svenja M Vater¹, Sebastian Weiße¹, Stojan Maleschlijski², Carmen Lotz³, Florian Koschitzki⁴, Thomas Schwartz³, Ursula Obst³, Axel Rosenhahn⁵

Affiliations

¹ Applied Physical Chemistry, Ruprecht-Karls-University Heidelberg, Germany ; Institute for Functional Interfaces, IFG, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Karlsruhe, Germany.
² Applied Physical Chemistry, Ruprecht-Karls-University Heidelberg, Germany ; Institute for Functional Interfaces, IFG, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Karlsruhe, Germany ; Analytical Chemistry-Biointerfaces, Ruhr-University Bochum, Germany.
³ Institute for Functional Interfaces, IFG, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Karlsruhe, Germany.
⁴ Applied Physical Chemistry, Ruprecht-Karls-University Heidelberg, Germany.
⁵ Institute for Functional Interfaces, IFG, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Karlsruhe, Germany ; Analytical Chemistry-Biointerfaces, Ruhr-University Bochum, Germany.

Abstract

Holographic 3D tracking was applied to record and analyze the swimming behavior of Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The obtained trajectories allow to qualitatively and quantitatively analyze the free swimming behavior of the bacterium. This can be classified into five distinct swimming patterns. In addition to the previously reported smooth and oscillatory swimming motions, three additional patterns are distinguished. We show that Pseudomonas aeruginosa performs helical movements which were so far only described for larger microorganisms. Occurrence of the swimming patterns was determined and transitions between the patterns were analyzed.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

MeSH terms

Pseudomonas aeruginosa / cytology*
Pseudomonas aeruginosa / physiology*

Grants and funding

The authors acknowledge the Office of Naval Research (grant number N00014-12-1-0498), the DFG project RO 2524/2-2, the DFG Graduiertenkolleg 1114, and the Biointerfaces Programme of the Helmholtz Society for supporting this work. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.