Evidence map›Paper›PMID 33636168›Full record

ArticleBiophysical journal2021

Collective motion enhances chemotaxis in a two-dimensional bacterial swarm.

Maojin Tian, Chi Zhang, Rongjing Zhang, Junhua Yuan

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Biophysical journal, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
14citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

14 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.

  1. Root colonization by beneficial rhizobacteria.FEMS microbiology reviews · 2024
    Pooled it
  2. Article
  3. Interactions Between Active Matters and Endogenous Fields.Advanced materials (Deerfield Beach, Fla.) · 2025
    Review
  4. Review
  5. Multiorifice acoustic microrobot for boundary-free multimodal 3D swimming.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  6. Speed-dependent bacterial surface swimming.Applied and environmental microbiology · 2024
    Article
  7. Article
  8. Article
  9. Flagellar motor remodeling during swarming requires FliL.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2023
    Article
  10. Swarming Motility Assays in Salmonella.Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.) · 2023
    Article
  11. Article
  12. Article
  13. Review
  14. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Maojin TianHefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale and Department of Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui, China.
Chi ZhangHefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale and Department of Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui, China.
Rongjing ZhangHefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale and Department of Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui, China. Electronic address: rjzhang@ustc.edu.cn.
Junhua YuanHefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale and Department of Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui, China. Electronic address: jhyuan@ustc.edu.cn.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

In a dilute liquid environment in which cell-cell interaction is negligible, flagellated bacteria, such as Escherichia coli, perform chemotaxis by biased random walks alternating between run-and-tumble. In a two-dimensional crowded environment, such as a bacterial swarm, the typical behavior of run-and-tumble is absent, and this raises the question whether and how bacteria can perform chemotaxis in a swarm. Here, by examining the chemotactic behavior as a function of the cell density, we showed that chemotaxis is surprisingly enhanced because of cell crowding in a bacterial swarm, and this enhancement is correlated with increase in the degree of cell body alignment. Cells tend to form clusters that move collectively in a swarm with increased effective run length, and we showed analytically that this resulted in increased drift velocity toward attractants. We also explained the enhancement by stochastically simulating bacterial chemotaxis in a swarm. We found that cell crowding in a swarm enhances chemotaxis if the cell-cell interactions used in the simulation induce cell-cell alignment, but it impedes chemotaxis if the interactions are collisions that randomize cell moving direction. Therefore, collective motion in a bacterial swarm enhances chemotaxis.

Indexed as

ChemotaxisEscherichia coliBacteriaComputer SimulationModels, BiologicalMotion

Identifiers

PMID33636168
PMCPMC8204213

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.