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Microbial interactions regulate their spread and survival in competitiveenvironments. It is not clear if the physical parameters of the environmentregulate the outcome of these interactions. In this work, we show that theopportunistic pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa occupies a larger area on thesubstratum in the presence of yeast such as Cryptococcus neoformans , thanwithout it. At the microscopic level, bacterial cells show an enhanced activityin the vicinity of yeast cells. We observe this behaviour even when the liveyeast cells are replaced with heat-killed cells or with spherical glass beadsof similar morphology, which suggests that the observed behaviour is notspecific to the biology of microbes. Upon careful investigation, we find that afluid pool is formed around yeast cells which facilitates the swimming of theflagellated P. aeruginosa , causing their enhanced motility. Using mathematicalmodeling we demonstrate how this local enhancement of bacterial motility leadsto the enhanced spread observed at the level of the plate. We find that thedynamics of the fluid landscape around the bacteria, mediated by the growingyeast lawn, affects the spreading. For instance, when the yeast lawn growsfaster, a bacterial colony prefers a lower initial loading of yeast cells foroptimum enhancement in the spread. We confirm our predictions using Candidaalbicans and C. neoformans, at different initial compositions. In summary, ourwork shows the importance of considering the dynamically changing physicalenvironment while studying bacterial motility in complex environments.

A dynamic fluid landscape mediates the spread of bacteria