PhD position: Micropatterning of microbial communities - tailoring cooperation versus competition

Microbial communities constitute a new frontier of biological enquiry. They play fundamental roles for ecosystem functioning and are important for health and disease in association with eukaryotic hosts. Despite their importance, our understanding of microbial communities and their interactions is limited. Detecting and analyzing the nature of microbial interactions is intrinsically difficult. Novel approaches are thus required to engineer synthetic communities for systematic analyses. The project addresses this demand and is an interdisciplinary project situated at the interface of microbiology, surface chemistry and nanotechnology. Our goal is to provide means to engineer microbial communities by addition or removal of individual bacteria or bacterial populations and to apply the technology to biological systems. We will develop protocols for micropatterning of bacteria down to the submicron range and thus provide spatially arranged distances between individuals. The novel approach will be based on fluidic force microscopy (FluidFM), a modified atomic force microscope provided with hollow cantilevers, which enables controlled spatial manipulation of micro objects such as bacteria but also the possibility of polymer dispensing offering for local surface coating. The project will encompass the study of model bacteria with already defined modes of interactions as well as testing for novel interactions between bacteria. Recorded data will be interpreted in light of the genetic repertoire of the bacteria and will help generating hypotheses on the nature of microbial interactions.

Microbial communities constitute a new frontier of biological enquiry. They play fundamental roles for ecosystem functioning and are important for health and disease in association with eukaryotic hosts. Despite their importance, our understanding of microbial communities and their interactions is limited. Detecting and analyzing the nature of microbial interactions is intrinsically difficult. Novel approaches are thus required to engineer synthetic communities for systematic analyses. The project addresses this demand and is an interdisciplinary project situated at the interface of microbiology, surface chemistry and nanotechnology. Our goal is to provide means to engineer microbial communities by addition or removal of individual bacteria or bacterial populations and to apply the technology to biological systems. We will develop protocols for micropatterning of bacteria down to the submicron range and thus provide spatially arranged distances between individuals. The novel approach will be based on fluidic force microscopy (FluidFM), a modified atomic force microscope provided with hollow cantilevers, which enables controlled spatial manipulation of micro objects such as bacteria but also the possibility of polymer dispensing offering for local surface coating. The project will encompass the study of model bacteria with already defined modes of interactions as well as testing for novel interactions between bacteria. Recorded data will be interpreted in light of the genetic repertoire of the bacteria and will help generating hypotheses on the nature of microbial interactions.

Establishment of a novel micropatterning protocol using FluidFM; Uncovering novel microbial interactions

Establishment of a novel micropatterning protocol using FluidFM;
Uncovering novel microbial interactions

Prof. Dr. Julia Vorholt ETH Zurich D-BIOL, Institute of Microbiology Vladimir-Prelog-Weg 4 8093 Zurich, Switzerland Email: vorholt@micro.biol.ethz.ch

Prof. Dr. Julia Vorholt
ETH Zurich
D-BIOL, Institute of Microbiology
Vladimir-Prelog-Weg 4
8093 Zurich, Switzerland
Email: vorholt@micro.biol.ethz.ch