Tuesday, June 30, 2026
Science

A bacterium's built-in compass, explained: Single-cell magnetometry confirms Earth-field alignment

Some bacterial species possess an astonishing ability: They use Earth's magnetic field to orient themselves. To better understand this mechanism, the team led by Argovia-Professor Martino Poggio from the Swiss Nanoscience Institute and the Department of Physics at the University of Basel took a clos...

A bacterium's built-in compass, explained: Single-cell magnetometry confirms Earth-field alignment
Image: Phys.org
Some bacterial species possess an astonishing ability: They use Earth's magnetic field to orient themselves. To better understand this mechanism, the team led by Argovia-Professor Martino Poggio from the Swiss Nanoscience Institute and the Department of Physics at the University of Basel took a closer look at the "magnetotactic" bacterium Magnetospirillum gryphiswaldense.

Originally published at Phys.org

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