Journal
SCIENCE
Volume 338, Issue 6104, Pages 264-266Publisher
AMER ASSOC ADVANCEMENT SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1126/science.1227289
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Funding
- U.S. Public Health Service [GM-59026, P30 DK 89507]
- Cystic Fibrosis Foundation Leroy Matthews Fellowship
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The opportunistic pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa uses a cell-cell communication system termed quorum sensing to control production of public goods, extracellular products that can be used by any community member. Not all individuals respond to quorum-sensing signals and synthesize public goods. Such social cheaters enjoy the benefits of the products secreted by cooperators. There are some P. aeruginosa cellular enzymes controlled by quorum sensing, and we show that quorum sensing-controlled expression of such private goods can put a metabolic constraint on social cheating and prevent a tragedy of the commons. Metabolic constraint of social cheating provides an explanation for private-goods regulation by a cooperative system and has general implications for population biology, infection control, and stabilization of quorum-sensing circuits in synthetic biology.
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