Outline of the study.

A: Cell death pattern (CDP). B: CDP mapped to the bottom layer of a colony in which the cells are in a quasi stable state. The upper layer of the colony is not shown in this image. C: Relief of lateral mechanical stress at the CDP area gives rise to the wrinkles. D: Reconstructed surface of biofilm. E: Velocity vectors and convergence of vector fields computed from material movement. F: Spatial correlation of CDP (green) and wrinkles (red). G: “Smiley face” simulation: an artificially designed cell death pattern results in wrinkle formation in the simulation shown in the lower panel (Grey scale proportional to height).