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Social Bacteria Know Who They Are (2 of 2)

Caption: Two different strains of the swarming bacterium Proteus mirabilis moving towards one another on a surface and making contact. A visually apparent boundary forms between swarming colonies of different P. mirabilis strains but not between colonies of a single strain, indicating that P. mirabilis populations have the ability to discriminate between self and non-self. This image has been pseudo-colored to better visualize the two different P. mirabilis strains. This image relates to an article that appeared in the July 11, 2008, issue of the journal Science, published by AAAS. The study, by Dr. Karine Gibbs and colleagues at the University of Washington in Seattle, Wash., was titled "Genetic Determinants of Self Identity and Social Recognition in Bacteria."

Credit: Image courtesy of Karine Gibbs, Jules Milner-Brage and E. Peter Greenberg

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