Renoir? Van Gogh? They're No Match For Bacteria!

We spend a great deal of our time attempting to thwart the proliferation of bacteria, and yet they've been the precursors of life as we know it. In spite of today's bacteriaphobic society -- with its combative sprays, potions and lotions -- the little buggers manage to prevail. They continue to be the ultimate opportunitistic strategists by keeping us on our toes at every turn. Literally everywhere, they multiply in a heartbeat and conquer bathroom surfaces, telephone receivers, doorknobs and -- these days, especially -- our corporately produced food. Scientists perpetually study them in an attempt to comprehend their disease-causing abilities, anticipate their versatility and ideally, to ultimately outwit them.

It has long been known that colonies work together to overcome odds thanks to the ability of cells to communicate with each other and transfer of genetic information. Beyond the battle of life and death, however, it is hard to ignore how something so reviled could still manage to be so beautiful.

Tel-Aviv University's Professor Eshel Ben-Jacob set out to determine the deep dark secrets that enable bacteria to adapt in the most challenging environments, never expecting that his studies would yield such phenomenal images. Ben-Jacob kept photographic records of the tens of billions of bacterial colonies that formed in his laboratory petri dishes under stress-imposed conditions. Hated as they may be, the images reflect the stunning beauty inherant in each spiral, curvature and outcropping. The bacteria proved over and over again that their will to live was so strong in the presence of antibiotics and other dire conditions that they perpetually rose to the challenge by morphing and adapting.

Explains Ben-Jacob, "We've tried exposing bacterial colonies to conditions so novel that the creatures could never have encountered them before. Tough conditions, conditions of life and death. We wanted to know how inventive the colonies could be in reworking their genetic code. For example, we took bacteria that can't move on agar but are able to roam freely in liquid. We put them on the wilderness of their worst nightmares, agar, and deprived them of food. The need to branch out in search of grazing land was a true creative challenge." Their creativite adaptation enabled them to prevail almost every single time. Though each photograph is enhanced with color and shading in order to provide depth and highlight every single impressive bacterial structure, the patterns are completely the work of Mother Nature.