Abstract

Self-assembly is a promising route for micro- and nano-fabrication with potential to revolutionise many areas of technology, including personalised medicine. Here we demonstrate that external control of the swimming speed of microswimmers can be used to self assemble reconfigurable designer structures in situ. We implement such ‘smart templated active self assembly’ in a fluid environment by using spatially patterned light fields to control photon-powered strains of motile Escherichia coli bacteria. The physics and biology governing the sharpness and formation speed of patterns is investigated using a bespoke strain designed to respond quickly to changes in light intensity. Our protocol provides a distinct paradigm for self-assembly of structures on the 10 μm to mm scale.

Details

Title
Painting with light-powered bacteria
Author
Arlt, Jochen 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Martinez, Vincent A 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Dawson, Angela 1 ; Pilizota, Teuta 2   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Poon, Wilson C K 1 

1  School of Physics and Astronomy, The University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK 
2  School of Biological Sciences and Centre for Synthetic and Systems Biology, The University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK 
Pages
1-7
Publication year
2018
Publication date
Feb 2018
Publisher
Nature Publishing Group
e-ISSN
20411723
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-03161-8
ProQuest document ID
2007436395
Copyright
© 2018. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.