*********************************
There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
*********************************
Carey Nadell, Ph.D.
Department of Biological Sciences
Darmouth College
ABSTRACT
Bacteria and other microbes commonly live in spatially constrained collectives, termed biofilms, which are ubiquitous in the environment and play a central role in microbial ecology. My group combines perspectives from ecological and evolutionary theory with molecular genetics and microscopy techniques to understand the spatial ecology of microbial biofilms at single-cell resolution. In the process of producing biofilms, bacteria engage in complex interactions that range from outright antagonism, to basic forms of resource competition, to highly cooperative behaviors. Understanding the net results of these many interactions is a major challenge in modern microbiology and a primary focus of my research group. Here I will talk about our groups research on the dynamics of predation by viral and bacterial attackers against biofilm populations. This work highlights how predation causes many unexpected downstream effects on biofilm spatial structure, population dynamics, and community assembly.
Host: Brian Hammer, Ph.D.
