Biofilms are like protective homes for bacteria. When a lot of bacteria come together, they produce a sticky, gooey slime that forms a layer around them. Over time, this layer gets thicker and transforms into a biofilm.
Inside this biofilm-house, bacteria live, communicate and nourish each other. Since not many molecules can enter this slime, biofilms protect the bacteria on the inside from external dangers or harsh environmental conditions like too much direct sunlight.
Biofilms protect bacteria like a house. By Noémie Matthey.
To feed the growing population on our planet, we need to improve our agriculture for plants to stay healthy and produce crops efficiently. One way to protect plants from diseases is to use biocontrol bacteria that actively kill intruding pathogens. Hence, by increasing our food supply, bacteria can help us save this planet.
Bacteria learned to live on all sorts of surfaces and in different environments. This also includes plants. Unfortunately, some bacteria can also make plants sick. These have special mechanisms with which they speak the language of plants with the goal to enter them.
Pathogens and dirty particles contaminate our water supply. But helpful microbes can remove harmful bacteria and pollutants and thus clean our drinking water.
Some bacteria have special hair-like structures to connect to surfaces or other organisms. These bacterial pili help them move along that surface or pull themselves closer to a prey or host. Read about why bacteria need those pili when they are out hunting or infecting us.
Microbes produce nutrients and help promote plant growth to produce more bountiful crops and sustainable agriculture.
Bacteria are constantly attacked by other microbes like viruses. But also bacteria developed mechanisms that make them immune to viral intruders. Read on to find out how bacteria fight off viruses to protect themselves and the whole bacterial community.
Microbes are everywhere, including our favorite foods. Learn how microbes help preserve foods while also adding flavors, textures, and nutrients to our meals.
In bacterial battles, there is more than just direct killing. Some bacteria even fight by destroying the houses of their opponents. We could learn a lot from these bacterial wars for our own fights against bacterial superbugs.
Throughout your day, you’re likely using several pieces of plastics. All this plastic waste takes up space in our landfills and overflows into rivers and oceans. Luckily, some bacteria can eat and degrade plastic to help us get rid of all this clutter. Read on to learn how plastic-degrading bacteria may be the key to a greener and healthier planet.
The players in the microbial world always interact with each other driving ecology and evolution forward. Bacteriophages thank their bacterial hosts for their production in a very special way: They protect bacteria from antibiotic attacks by forming shielding walls around the cells. While the microbial world gets more and more complex with such mechanisms, it also represents another strategy for antimicrobial resistances.
To protect themselves from the environment, bacteria build shielding biofilms houses. But once such a house gets old, bacteria need to break out it. For that, bacteria produce special scissors that can break biofilms and set free the bacteria.
Bacteria in your mouth protect your teeth from pathogenic bacteria. When you eat lots of sugars, the pathogens can fight off your friendly bacteria. The more pathogenic bacteria grow on your teeth, the more acids they produce that can cause caries and cavities. Learn about the bacterial battles in your mouths.
Bacteria can be major problems for human health. One of the reasons for that is because they have the ability to hide in their own houses. Such a house is called a bacterial biofilm which protect bacteria from harsh environments, toxic chemicals and to form a community within the biofilm.
Bacteria developed different antimicrobial resistance mechanisms to get rid of antibiotics. Here, you will learn what bacteria do with antibiotics so that they don’t harm them and what superbugs are.
Biofilms are like protective homes for bacteria. When a lot of bacteria come together, they produce a sticky, gooey slime that forms a layer around them. Over time, this layer gets thicker and transforms into a biofilm.
Inside this biofilm-house, bacteria live, communicate and nourish each other. Since not many molecules can enter this slime, biofilms protect the bacteria on the inside from external dangers or harsh environmental conditions like too much direct sunlight.
Biofilms protect bacteria like a house. By Noémie Matthey.
