Early development and quorum sensing in bacterial biofilms

Abstract.

 We develop mathematical models to examine the formation, growth and quorum sensing activity of bacterial biofilms. The growth aspects of the model are based on the assumption of a continuum of bacterial cells whose growth generates movement, within the developing biofilm, described by a velocity field. A model proposed in Ward et al. (2001) to describe quorum sensing, a process by which bacteria monitor their own population density by the use of quorum sensing molecules (QSMs), is coupled with the growth model. The resulting system of nonlinear partial differential equations is solved numerically, revealing results which are qualitatively consistent with experimental ones. Analytical solutions derived by assuming uniform initial conditions demonstrate that, for large time, a biofilm grows algebraically with time; criteria for linear growth of the biofilm biomass, consistent with experimental data, are established. The analysis reveals, for a biologically realistic limit, the existence of a bifurcation between non-active and active quorum sensing in the biofilm. The model also predicts that travelling waves of quorum sensing behaviour can occur within a certain time frame; while the travelling wave analysis reveals a range of possible travelling wave speeds, numerical solutions suggest that the minimum wave speed, determined by linearisation, is realised for a wide class of initial conditions.