Bacteria have developed a large array of motility mechanisms to exploit available resources
and environments. These mechanisms can be broadly classified into swimming in aqueous …

Optical tweezers have become the method of choice in single-molecule manipulation
studies. In this Primer, we first review the physical principles of optical tweezers and the …

The bacterial flagellum is a macromolecular protein complex that harvests energy from uni-
directional ion flow across the inner membrane to power bacterial swimming via rotation of …

Bacteria have evolved a remarkable array of sophisticated nanomachines to export various
virulence factors across the bacterial cell envelope. In recent years, considerable progress …

The bacterial flagellum is a helical filamentous organelle responsible for motility. In bacterial
species possessing flagella at the cell exterior, the long helical flagellar filament acts as a …

Fluorescence microscopy is an invaluable tool in the biosciences, a genuine workhorse
technique offering exceptional contrast in conjunction with high specificity of labelling with …

β-Barrel outer membrane proteins (OMPs) represent the major proteinaceous component of
the outer membrane (OM) of Gram-negative bacteria. These proteins perform key roles in …

Liquid-liquid phase separation is emerging as a crucial phenomenon in several
fundamental cell processes. A range of eukaryotic systems exhibit liquid condensates …

Single-molecule biophysics has transformed our understanding of biology, but also of the
physics of life. More exotic than simple soft matter, biomatter lives far from thermal …

Mechanosensing by flagella is thought to trigger bacterial swarmer-cell differentiation, an
important step in pathogenesis. How flagellar motors sense mechanical stimuli is not known …