Communication is an incredibly powerful tool for species to survive in a hostile environment. With that in mind, it is perhaps unsurprising that even some of the simplest life forms, bacteria, have developed communication systems to improve their chances of survival. Bacteria use a primitive chemical communication system known as quorum sensing, sharing information about the local bacterial population density to coordinate behaviors through the secretion and recognition of small molecules. In the Muir lab here at Princeton, we study the biochemical mechanism of quorum sensing in the gram-positive pathogen, Staphylococcus aureus. Our general strategy is to take this complex system and rebuild it in a controlled environment, recapitulating the constituent components of the system in a test tube to understand how each part works and how we can use this information to develop better antibiotics.