Imaging and Analysis of Microbial Motility: From Single Cells to Communities
A special issue of Life (ISSN 2075-1729). This special issue belongs to the section "Microbiology".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 20 September 2026 | Viewed by 2
Special Issue Editor
Interests: microscopy; live cell imaging; fluorescence imaging
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Motility is present in all kingdoms of life, having evolved independently in Bacteria, Eukarya, and Archaea to serve crucial roles in cell and organism survival. Research into diverse microorganisms with various motility patterns has expanded over the past two decades, identifying new types of motility (at least 18 are known so far), motility in previously unexplored classes of microorganisms, and analyzing the physics of swimming at the micron scale. Motility quantification remains challenging due to the technological difficulty of imaging live, active microorganisms, especially in dense cultures, the large volumes of the resulting data, and the challenges in computer-based object detection and tracking. This Special Issue explores new experimental, computational, and biological insights into microbial motility. Papers are sought on new approaches to microscopy and labeling, sample handling, or preparation to reveal special motility features, and motility studies of poorly understood organisms, especially Archaea. Software tools and techniques for analysis that are of use to the broad community are also of great interest.
Prof. Dr. Jay Nadeau
Guest Editor
Manuscript Submission Information
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Keywords
- motility
- cell tracking
- biofilm
- swimming
- swarming
- Archaea
- flagella
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