Princeton University’s Bonnie Bassler explains bacterial quorum sensing as multilingual communication

Key facts

• Bonnie Bassler, molecular biologist at Princeton University, delivered a lecture titled ‘A chemical language that enables communication between diverse organisms’ at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bengaluru.
• Bacteria use quorum sensing to communicate and coordinate collective behaviour.
• Vibrio cholerae, the cholera-causing bacterium, and Vibrio fischeri, a bioluminescent symbiont of Hawaiian squid, were cited as key examples.
• Anti-quorum sensing therapies are proposed as alternatives to traditional antibiotics.
• The lecture was organised by TNQ, an Indian non-profit supporting basic research in mathematics and life sciences, and coincided with the International Day for Women and Girls in Science.
• Prof. Bassler is the 2022 Wolf Prize in Chemistry and 2023 Canada Gairdner Award winner.