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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Apr 6, 2026

Maintaining Wolbachia in Cell-free Medium
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Turning Bacteria Suspensions into Superfluids.

Héctor Matías López1, Jérémie Gachelin2, Carine Douarche3

  • 1Université Paris-Sud, CNRS, F-91405, Lab FAST, Bâtiment 502, Campus Univ, Orsay F-91405, France.

Physical Review Letters
|July 25, 2015
PubMed
Summary

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This study reveals that active Escherichia coli suspensions exhibit a unique "superfluidlike" transition at high concentrations, where bacterial activity overcomes viscous resistance to flow. This finding is crucial for understanding active matter rheology.

Area of Science:

  • Rheology
  • Active Matter Physics
  • Microbiology

Background:

  • Active suspensions, like those containing motile bacteria, exhibit complex flow behaviors.
  • Understanding the rheological properties of these systems is key to predicting their macroscopic responses.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the rheological response of active Escherichia coli suspensions under simple shear.
  • To determine the effective viscosity and characteristic time scales of bacterial organization.

Main Methods:

  • Experiments were conducted across a wide range of shear rates and concentrations.
  • Rheological measurements were used to analyze the suspension's behavior.

Main Results:

  • In the dilute regime, a low-shear Newtonian plateau was observed, with shear viscosity decreasing with concentration.

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  • In the semi-dilute regime, active bacteria exhibited a
  • superfluidlike
  • transition, where viscous resistance to shear vanished.

    • Conclusions:

    • The activity of shear-organized Escherichia coli swimmers can overcome dissipative viscous effects macroscopically.
    • This suggests potential for novel fluid dynamics in active biological systems.