Science exchange logo white
  • Solutions
      Buyers

      We are making R&D services readily available to every organization that seeks to make scientific impact. Learn More

      Providers

      We are changing the way providers access and engage customers to streamline the sale and delivery of R&D services. Learn More

      Industries Agriscience Animal Health Basic Research Biopharmaceutical Chemicals Consumer Health Food Science Medical Devices
      Reproducibility

      We believe that good experiments can and should be independently replicated and validated. Learn More

  • Resources
    Innovation Blog
    Customer Stories
    Events
    Industry Trends
    News
    Product Updates
    Help Center
  • About
    About
    Our Story
    Leadership
    Partners
    Join the Team
  • Contact
  • Log In Sign Up
  • Get a Demo
  • Measuring the stiffness of bacterial cells from growth rates in hydrogels of tunable elasticity.

    Mol Microbiol. 84(5):874-91. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2958.2012.08063.x. June 2012. View on PubMed.
  • Authors

    Tuson HH, Auer GK, Renner LD, Hasebe M, Tropini C, Salick M, Crone WC, Gopinathan A, Huang KC, and Weibel DB
  • Abstract

    Although bacterial cells are known to experience large forces from osmotic pressure differences and their local microenvironment, quantitative measurements of the mechanical properties of growing bacterial cells have been limited. We provide an experimental approach and theoretical framework for measuring the mechanical properties of live bacteria. We encapsulated bacteria in agarose with a user-defined stiffness, measured the growth rate of individual cells and fit data to a thin-shell mechanical model to extract the effective longitudinal Young's modulus of the cell envelope of Escherichia coli (50-150 MPa), Bacillus subtilis (100-200 MPa) and Pseudomonas aeruginosa (100-200 MPa). Our data provide estimates of cell wall stiffness similar to values obtained via the more labour-intensive technique of atomic force microscopy. To address physiological perturbations that produce changes in cellular mechanical properties, we tested the effect of A22-induced MreB depolymerization on the stiffness of E. coli. The effective longitudinal Young's modulus was not significantly affected by A22 treatment at short time scales, supporting a model in which the interactions between MreB and the cell wall persist on the same time scale as growth. Our technique therefore enables the rapid determination of how changes in genotype and biochemistry affect the mechanical properties of the bacterial envelope.

Science exchange logo white

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn

Solutions

  • Buyers
  • Providers
  • Reproducibility

Industries

  • Agriscience
  • Animal Health
  • Basic Research
  • Biopharmaceutical
  • Chemicals
  • Consumer Health
  • Food Science
  • Medical Devices

Resources

  • Innovation Blog
  • Customer Stories
  • Events
  • Industry Trends
  • News
  • Product Updates

About

  • Our Story
  • Leadership
  • Partners
  • Join the Team

Support

  • Contact Us
  • Help Center
  • Trust
  • Terms of Use
  • Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2021 Science Exchange, Inc. All rights reserved.