Finite response time in stripe formation by bacteria with density-suppressed motility

TL;DR

This paper models how finite response times in bacteria's tumbling behavior lead to stripe pattern formation, revealing the critical role of delay and non-linearity in instability and pattern emergence.

Contribution

It introduces a simplified regulatory model incorporating response delay, analytically describing how finite response times induce pattern-forming instabilities in bacterial density.

Findings

Response delay causes instability in homogeneous bacterial distributions.

Longer response times increase the minimum system size for pattern formation.

High non-linearity in response amplifies the instability at long wavelengths.

Abstract

Genetically engineered bacteria to increase the tumbling frequency of the run-and-tumble motion for the higher local bacterial density form visible stripe pattern composed of successive high and low density regions on an agar plate. We propose a model that includes a simplified regulatory dynamics of the tumbling frequency in individual cells to clarify the role of finite response time. We show that the time-delay due to the response dynamics results in the instability in a homogeneous steady state allowing a pattern formation. For further understanding, we propose a simplified two-state model that allows us to describe the response time dependence of the instability analytically. We show that the instability occurs at long wave length as long as the response time is comparable with the tumbling timescale and the non-linearity of the response function to the change of the density is high enough. The minimum system size to see the instability grows with the response time $\tau$, proportional to $\sqrt{\tau}$ in the large delay limit.