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Swarming

It is known that Bacillus subtilis (strain 168) which is generally used in the lab is unable to swarm on a solid surface eg. agar plate. This is because of two reasons which are:

1. Surfactin is a natural surfactant which helps in reducing surface tension and aids the bacteria to swarm on a solid or semi solid medium. Strain 168 is unable to produce the bacterial cyclic lipopeptide surfactin.
2. Strain 168 is also unable to bio synthesize flagellum and thus has a very low amount of swarming.

*sfp

Strain 168 is unable to produce surfactin because it contains a frameshift mutation in the gene named sfp. In a non domisticated strain 3610, sfp gene is intact and thus produces a protein which helps in the post translational modification of the immature surfactin peptide formed by the srfABCD operon. After the modification, this peptide is exported out of the cell and helps in breaking the surface tension and aids the movement of the bacteria.