Microbiology Research in the Waite-Cusic Food Safety and Quality Systems Laboratory at Oregon State

Some bacteria have interesting ways of moving and we caught one that “wanders”. According to the scientific literature, bacteria that move this way secrete a surfactant that breaks the surface tension and allows them to slip across solid surfaces. The colony will produce filamentous cells which kind of “direct the troops” to move. No flagella are involved. This type of movement has mostly been described for Paenibacillus vortex, so we suspect this is the identity of our culture. Confirmation of this identity is currently in process.