article · 05/04/2025
Bacterial Glass Transition
Résumé
Bacterial assemblies exhibit rich collective behaviors that control their biological functions, making them a relevant object of study from an active matter physics perspective. Dense bacterial suspensions self-organize into distinct physical phases with intriguing dynamical properties. Here, we study dense two-dimensional films of swimming bacteria using advanced imaging techniques and machine learning. By varying density, we uncover a bacterial glass transition, a direct active matter analogue of equilibrium glass transitions in colloidal and molecular fluids. The transition is marked by a dramatic slowdown of dynamics with minimal structural change. Strong dynamic heterogeneity emerges in space and time, leading to an anomalous violation of the Stokes-Einstein relation and a growing dynamic correlation length, universally observed across five bacterial strains. Our results establish that bacterial colonies exhibit glassy dynamics, but their living, active nature gives them unique properties, paving the way for new research regarding how non-equilibrium physics impacts biology
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Maliet, M., Fix-Boulier, N., Berthier, L., & Deforet, M. (2025). Bacterial Glass Transition. arXiv. https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.04205@article{Maliet2025_482,
author = {Maliet, Martin and Fix-Boulier, Nicolas and Berthier, Ludovic and Deforet, Maxime},
year = {2025},
month = {4},
title = {Bacterial Glass Transition},
journal = {arXiv},
abstract = {Bacterial assemblies exhibit rich collective behaviors that control their biological functions, making them a relevant object of study from an active matter physics perspective. Dense bacterial suspensions self-organize into distinct physical phases with intriguing dynamical properties. Here, we study dense two-dimensional films of swimming bacteria using advanced imaging techniques and machine learning. By varying density, we uncover a bacterial glass transition, a direct active matter analogue of equilibrium glass transitions in colloidal and molecular fluids. The transition is marked by a dramatic slowdown of dynamics with minimal structural change. Strong dynamic heterogeneity emerges in space and time, leading to an anomalous violation of the Stokes-Einstein relation and a growing dynamic correlation length, universally observed across five bacterial strains. Our results establish that bacterial colonies exhibit glassy dynamics, but their living, active nature gives them unique properties, paving the way for new research regarding how non-equilibrium physics impacts biology},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.04205},
}TY - JOUR
AU - Maliet, Martin
AU - Fix-Boulier, Nicolas
AU - Berthier, Ludovic
AU - Deforet, Maxime
PY - 2025
DA - 2025/04/05
TI - Bacterial Glass Transition
JO - arXiv
AB - Bacterial assemblies exhibit rich collective behaviors that control their biological functions, making them a relevant object of study from an active matter physics perspective. Dense bacterial suspensions self-organize into distinct physical phases with intriguing dynamical properties. Here, we study dense two-dimensional films of swimming bacteria using advanced imaging techniques and machine learning. By varying density, we uncover a bacterial glass transition, a direct active matter analogue of equilibrium glass transitions in colloidal and molecular fluids. The transition is marked by a dramatic slowdown of dynamics with minimal structural change. Strong dynamic heterogeneity emerges in space and time, leading to an anomalous violation of the Stokes-Einstein relation and a growing dynamic correlation length, universally observed across five bacterial strains. Our results establish that bacterial colonies exhibit glassy dynamics, but their living, active nature gives them unique properties, paving the way for new research regarding how non-equilibrium physics impacts biology
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.04205
ER -