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Stability of Cross-Feeding Polymorphisms in Microbial Communities

Cross-feeding, a relationship wherein one organism consumes metabolites excreted by another, is a ubiquitous feature of natural and clinically-relevant microbial communities and could be a key factor promoting diversity in extreme and/or nutrient-poor environments. However, it remains unclear how re...

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Autores principales: Gudelj, Ivana, Kinnersley, Margie, Rashkov, Peter, Schmidt, Karen, Rosenzweig, Frank
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2016
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5201250/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28036324
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1005269
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author Gudelj, Ivana
Kinnersley, Margie
Rashkov, Peter
Schmidt, Karen
Rosenzweig, Frank
author_facet Gudelj, Ivana
Kinnersley, Margie
Rashkov, Peter
Schmidt, Karen
Rosenzweig, Frank
author_sort Gudelj, Ivana
collection PubMed
description Cross-feeding, a relationship wherein one organism consumes metabolites excreted by another, is a ubiquitous feature of natural and clinically-relevant microbial communities and could be a key factor promoting diversity in extreme and/or nutrient-poor environments. However, it remains unclear how readily cross-feeding interactions form, and therefore our ability to predict their emergence is limited. In this paper we developed a mathematical model parameterized using data from the biochemistry and ecology of an E. coli cross-feeding laboratory system. The model accurately captures short-term dynamics of the two competitors that have been observed empirically and we use it to systematically explore the stability of cross-feeding interactions for a range of environmental conditions. We find that our simple system can display complex dynamics including multi-stable behavior separated by a critical point. Therefore whether cross-feeding interactions form depends on the complex interplay between density and frequency of the competitors as well as on the concentration of resources in the environment. Moreover, we find that subtly different environmental conditions can lead to dramatically different results regarding the establishment of cross-feeding, which could explain the apparently unpredictable between-population differences in experimental outcomes. We argue that mathematical models are essential tools for disentangling the complexities of cross-feeding interactions.
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spelling pubmed-52012502017-01-19 Stability of Cross-Feeding Polymorphisms in Microbial Communities Gudelj, Ivana Kinnersley, Margie Rashkov, Peter Schmidt, Karen Rosenzweig, Frank PLoS Comput Biol Research Article Cross-feeding, a relationship wherein one organism consumes metabolites excreted by another, is a ubiquitous feature of natural and clinically-relevant microbial communities and could be a key factor promoting diversity in extreme and/or nutrient-poor environments. However, it remains unclear how readily cross-feeding interactions form, and therefore our ability to predict their emergence is limited. In this paper we developed a mathematical model parameterized using data from the biochemistry and ecology of an E. coli cross-feeding laboratory system. The model accurately captures short-term dynamics of the two competitors that have been observed empirically and we use it to systematically explore the stability of cross-feeding interactions for a range of environmental conditions. We find that our simple system can display complex dynamics including multi-stable behavior separated by a critical point. Therefore whether cross-feeding interactions form depends on the complex interplay between density and frequency of the competitors as well as on the concentration of resources in the environment. Moreover, we find that subtly different environmental conditions can lead to dramatically different results regarding the establishment of cross-feeding, which could explain the apparently unpredictable between-population differences in experimental outcomes. We argue that mathematical models are essential tools for disentangling the complexities of cross-feeding interactions. Public Library of Science 2016-12-30 /pmc/articles/PMC5201250/ /pubmed/28036324 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1005269 Text en © 2016 Gudelj et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Gudelj, Ivana
Kinnersley, Margie
Rashkov, Peter
Schmidt, Karen
Rosenzweig, Frank
Stability of Cross-Feeding Polymorphisms in Microbial Communities
title Stability of Cross-Feeding Polymorphisms in Microbial Communities
title_full Stability of Cross-Feeding Polymorphisms in Microbial Communities
title_fullStr Stability of Cross-Feeding Polymorphisms in Microbial Communities
title_full_unstemmed Stability of Cross-Feeding Polymorphisms in Microbial Communities
title_short Stability of Cross-Feeding Polymorphisms in Microbial Communities
title_sort stability of cross-feeding polymorphisms in microbial communities
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5201250/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28036324
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1005269
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