FIGURE 5.

Interspecies interactions are detectable within the polymicrobial biofilm. To form a single-species biofilm, each bacterial species was grown in wells in a 96 well plate. S. aureus and commensals were incubated for 40 h, while P. aeruginosa was incubated for 20 h before harvesting to determine the number of cfu. Polymicrobial biofilms were generated by incubating S. aureus and commensals together for 40 h in the combinations indicated. When P. aeruginosa was present, it was added after 20 h, and thus was only in combination with the others for 20 h. SE: S. epidermidis; ML: M. luteus; SA: S. aureus; PA: P. aeruginosa.