Engineering synthetic spatial patterns in microbial populations and communities

Spatial pattern formation is an important feature of almost all biological systems. Thanks to the advances in synthetic biology, we can engineer microbial populations and communities to display sophisticated spatial patterns. This bottom-up approach can be used to elucidate the general principles underlying pattern formation. Moreover, it is of interest for a plethora of applications, from the production of novel living materials to medical diagnostics. In this short review, we comment on the recent experimental advances in engineering the spatial patterns formed by microbes. We classify the synthetic patterns based on the input signals provided and the biological processes deployed. We highlight some applications of microbial pattern formation and discuss the challenges and potential future directions.