Effect of motility on the transport of bacteria populations through a porous medium

The role of activity on the hydrodynamic dispersion of bacteria in a model porous medium is studied by tracking thousands of bacteria in a microfluidic chip containing randomly placed pillars. We first evaluate the spreading dynamics of two populations of motile and non-motile bacteria injected at different flow rates. In both cases, we observe that the mean and the variance of the distances covered by the bacteria vary linearly with time and flow velocity, a result qualitatively consistent with the standard geometric dispersion picture. However, quantitatively, the motiles bacteria display a systematic retardation effect when compared to the non-motile ones. Furthermore, the shape of the traveled distance distribution in the flow direction differs significantly for both the motile and the non-motile strain, hence probing a markedly different exploration process. For the non-motile bacteria, the distribution is Gaussian whereas for the motile ones, the distribution displays a positive skewness and spreads exponentially downstream akin to a Gamma distribution. The detailed microscopic study of the trajectories reveals two salient effects characterizing the exploration process of motile bacteria : (i) The emergence of an "active" retention effect due to an extended exploration of the pore surfaces, (ii) an enhanced spreading at the forefront due to the transport of bacteria along "fast-tracks" where they acquire a velocity larger than the local flow velocity. We finally discuss the practical applications of these effects on the large-scale macroscopic transfer and contamination processes caused by microbes in natural environments.

[1]  Jörn Dunkel,et al.  Rheotaxis facilitates upstream navigation of mammalian sperm cells , 2014, eLife.

[2]  Roman Stocker,et al.  Bacterial rheotaxis , 2012, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[3]  J. Bear Dynamics of Fluids in Porous Media , 1975 .

[4]  Marina Sidortsov,et al.  Role of tumbling in bacterial swarming. , 2017, Physical review. E.

[5]  Eric Lauga,et al.  Geometric capture and escape of a microswimmer colliding with an obstacle. , 2014, Soft matter.

[6]  Antonio-José Almeida,et al.  NAT , 2019, Springer Reference Medizin.

[7]  Salima Rafaï,et al.  Effective viscosity of microswimmer suspensions. , 2009, Physical review letters.

[8]  A Libchaber,et al.  E. Coli and oxygen: a motility transition. , 2009, Physical review letters.

[9]  Harold Auradou,et al.  Turning Bacteria Suspensions into Superfluids. , 2015, Physical review letters.

[10]  G. Uhlenbeck,et al.  On the Theory of the Brownian Motion , 1930 .

[11]  S. Uhlenbrook,et al.  Transport of Escherichia coli in 25 m quartz sand columns. , 2011, Journal of contaminant hydrology.

[12]  P. Alam ‘A’ , 2021, Composites Engineering: An A–Z Guide.

[13]  H. Koser,et al.  Direct upstream motility in Escherichia coli. , 2012, Biophysical journal.

[14]  H. Chaté,et al.  Onset of collective and cohesive motion. , 2004, Physical review letters.

[15]  M. Kardar,et al.  Pressure is not a state function for generic active fluids , 2014, Nature Physics.

[16]  A. Libchaber,et al.  Particle diffusion in a quasi-two-dimensional bacterial bath. , 2000, Physical review letters.

[17]  Roman Stocker,et al.  Bacterial transport suppressed by fluid shear , 2014, Nature Physics.

[18]  T. Meggyes,et al.  Advanced Groundwater Remediation: Active and Passive Technologies , 2002 .

[19]  George M. Hornberger,et al.  Bacterial transport in porous media: Evaluation of a model using laboratory observations , 1992 .

[20]  I. Aranson,et al.  Focusing of active particles in a converging flow , 2017, 1707.08665.

[21]  Sriram Ramaswamy,et al.  Rheology of active-particle suspensions. , 2003, Physical review letters.

[22]  John W. Roberts,et al.  Collective Bacterial Dynamics Revealed Using a Three-Dimensional Population-Scale Defocused Particle Tracking Technique , 2006, Applied and Environmental Microbiology.

[23]  Flow-controlled densification and anomalous dispersion of E. coli through a constriction , 2013 .

[24]  David Saintillan,et al.  The Dilute Rheology of Swimming Suspensions: A Simple Kinetic Model , 2010 .

[25]  Christopher A. Voigt,et al.  Environmentally controlled invasion of cancer cells by engineered bacteria. , 2006, Journal of molecular biology.

[26]  J. Schijven,et al.  Determining straining of Escherichia coli from breakthrough curves. , 2005, Journal of contaminant hydrology.

[27]  Vijay P Singh,et al.  Contamination of water resources by pathogenic bacteria , 2014, AMB Express.

[28]  B. Logan,et al.  Influence of Fluid Velocity and Cell Concentration on the Transport of Motile and Nonmotile Bacteria in Porous Media , 1998 .

[29]  Timothy Scheibe,et al.  Processes in microbial transport in the natural subsurface , 2002 .

[30]  S. Uhlenbrook,et al.  The effect of surface characteristics on the transport of multiple Escherichia coli isolates in large scale columns of quartz sand. , 2009, Water research.

[31]  Markus Bär,et al.  Large-scale collective properties of self-propelled rods. , 2009, Physical review letters.

[32]  A. Pauss,et al.  Comparison of transport between two bacteria in saturated porous media with distinct pore size distribution , 2016 .

[33]  P. Maloszewski,et al.  Transport and bacterial interactions of three bacterial strains in saturated column experiments. , 2011, Environmental science & technology.

[34]  Robert Austin,et al.  A Wall of Funnels Concentrates Swimming Bacteria , 2007, Journal of bacteriology.

[35]  Henry Pinkard,et al.  Advanced methods of microscope control using μManager software. , 2014, Journal of biological methods.

[36]  R. Ward,et al.  Development of a bacterial transport model for coarse soils , 1989 .

[37]  J. McCarthy,et al.  Use of short-pulse experiments to study bacteria transport through porous media , 1994 .

[38]  Eric Lauga,et al.  Hydrodynamic attraction of swimming microorganisms by surfaces. , 2008, Physical review letters.

[39]  P. Cochat,et al.  Et al , 2008, Archives de pediatrie : organe officiel de la Societe francaise de pediatrie.

[40]  P. Saffman,et al.  A theory of dispersion in a porous medium , 1959, Journal of Fluid Mechanics.

[41]  Anke Lindner,et al.  Living on the edge: transfer and traffic of E. coli in a confined flow. , 2015, Soft matter.

[42]  Adv , 2019, International Journal of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine.

[43]  Andrey Sokolov,et al.  Reduction of viscosity in suspension of swimming bacteria. , 2009, Physical review letters.

[44]  Nathalie Tufenkji,et al.  Modeling microbial transport in porous media: Traditional approaches and recent developments , 2007 .

[45]  M. Becker,et al.  Bacterial Transport Experiments in Fractured Crystalline Bedrock , 2003, Ground water.

[46]  H. Berg,et al.  Three-dimensional tracking of motile bacteria near a solid planar surface. , 1995, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[47]  G. Ariel,et al.  Anomalous Fluctuations in the Orientation and Velocity of Swarming Bacteria. , 2016, Biophysical journal.

[48]  P. Maloszewski,et al.  Effects of Velocity on the Transport of Two Bacteria Through Saturated Sand , 1999 .

[49]  S. Martel,et al.  Magneto-aerotactic bacteria deliver drug-containing nanoliposomes to tumour hypoxic regions , 2016, Nature nanotechnology.

[50]  H. Koser,et al.  Hydrodynamic surface interactions enable Escherichia coli to seek efficient routes to swim upstream. , 2007, Physical review letters.

[51]  P. Alam ‘E’ , 2021, Composites Engineering: An A–Z Guide.

[52]  A Karimi,et al.  Hydrodynamic mechanisms of cell and particle trapping in microfluidics. , 2013, Biomicrofluidics.

[53]  L. Brown,et al.  Microbial enhanced oil recovery (MEOR). , 2010, Current opinion in microbiology.

[54]  Tao Long,et al.  Enhanced transverse migration of bacteria by chemotaxis in a porous T-sensor. , 2008, Environmental science & technology.

[55]  Jun Zhang,et al.  Hydrodynamic capture of microswimmers into sphere-bound orbits. , 2013, Soft matter.

[56]  S. Ramaswamy,et al.  Hydrodynamics of soft active matter , 2013 .

[57]  M. Yavuz Corapcioglu,et al.  Microbial transport in soils and groundwater: A numerical model , 1985 .