Journal
SCIENCE
Volume 361, Issue 6400, Pages 402-+Publisher
AMER ASSOC ADVANCEMENT SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1126/science.aat2058
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Funding
- Dictyostelium Functional Genomics Program Project Grant from the National Institutes of Health [PO1 HD39691]
- EUNICE KENNEDY SHRIVER NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF CHILD HEALTH & HUMAN DEVELOPMENT [P01HD039691] Funding Source: NIH RePORTER
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The social amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum maintains a microbiome during multicellular development: bacteria are carried in migrating slugs and as endosymbionts within amoebae and spores. Bacterial carriage and endosymbiosis are induced by the secreted lectin discoidin I that binds bacteria, protects them from extracellular killing, and alters their retention within amoebae. This altered handling of bacteria also occurs with bacteria coated by plant lectins and leads to DNA transfer from bacteria to amoebae. Thus, lectins alter the cellular response of D. discoideum to bacteria to establish the amoebae's microbiome. Mammalian cells can also maintain intracellular bacteria when presented with bacteria coated with lectins, so heterologous lectins may induce endosymbiosis in animals. Our results suggest that endogenous or environmental lectins may influence microbiome homeostasis across eukaryotic phylogeny.
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