Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Volume 113, Issue 8, Pages 2152-2157Publisher
NATL ACAD SCIENCES
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1520615113
Keywords
social evolution; sociomicrobiology; Bacillus subtilis; bacteria; quorum sensing
Categories
Funding
- European Research Council [281301]
- European Research Council (ERC) [281301] Funding Source: European Research Council (ERC)
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Bacterial quorum sensing enables bacteria to cooperate in a density-dependent manner via the group-wide secretion and detection of specific autoinducer molecules. Many bacterial species show high intraspecific diversity of autoinducer-receptor alleles, called pherotypes. The autoinducer produced by one pherotype activates its coencoded receptor, but not the receptor of another pherotype. It is unclear what selection forces drive the maintenance of pherotype diversity. Here, we use the ComQXPA system of Bacillus subtilis as a model system, to show that pherotype diversity can be maintained by facultative cheating-a minority pherotype exploits the majority, but resumes cooperation when its frequency increases. We find that the maintenance of multiple pherotypes by facultative cheating can persist under kin-selection conditions that select against obligate cheaters quorum-sensing response null mutants. Our results therefore support a role for facultative cheating and kin selection in the evolution of quorum-sensing diversity.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available