bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.01.27.428527; this version posted January 28, 2021. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under aCC-BY-ND 4.0 International license. The environment topography alters the transition from single-cell populations to multicellular structures in Myxococcus xanthus Hernández Ramos, Karla C.1,2∞, Rodríguez-Sánchez, Edna2,3∞, Arias del Angel, Juan Antonio2, Arzola, Alejandro V.4, Benítez, Mariana2, Escalante, Ana E.2, Franci, Alessio5, Volpe, Giovanni6, Rivera-Yoshida, Natsuko2,5*. 1 Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico. 2 Laboratorio Nacional de Ciencias de la Sostenibilidad, Instituto de Ecología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, CDMX, México 04510, Mexico. 3 Current address: Posgrado en Ciencias Biológicas, Instituto de Geología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, 04510, Mexico. 4 Instituto de Física, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Apdo Postal 20-364, 01000 Cd de México, Mexico. 5 Departamento de Matemáticas, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico. 6 Department of Physics, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden. ∞ Both authors equally contributed to this work * Corresponding author:
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[email protected] ABSTRACT The social soil-dwelling bacteria Myxococcus xanthus can form multicellular structures, known as fruiting bodies. Experiments in homogeneous environments have shown that this process is affected by the physico-chemical properties of the substrate, but they have largely neglected the role of complex topographies.