  Positioning of the midcell division plane within the bacterium E. coli is
controlled by the min system of proteins: MinC, MinD and MinE. These proteins
coherently oscillate from end to end of the bacterium. We present a
reaction--diffusion model describing the diffusion of min proteins along the
bacterium and their transfer between the cytoplasmic membrane and cytoplasm.
Our model spontaneously generates protein oscillations in good agreement with
experiments. We explore the oscillation stability, frequency and wavelength as
a function of protein concentration and bacterial length.
