Fig. 6.

Schematic diagram showing a hypothetical mechanism for how the MO-1 flagellar apparatus might work efficiently with a tight bundle of 7 flagella and 24 fibrils encased in a sheath. The flagella are represented as large brown gears, the fibrils are represented as small blue-green gears, and the sheath is represented as the pale-blue surrounding circle. The flagella and fibrils rotate counterclockwise and clockwise, respectively, as indicated by arrows, to minimize the friction at high-speed rotation.