Single-Cell Approach Reveals Intercellular Heterogeneity in Phage-Producing Capacities

Bacteriophage burst size is the average number of phage virions released from infected bacterial cells, and its magnitude depends on the duration of an intracellular progeny accumulation phase. Burst size is often measured at the population level, not the single-cell level, and consequently, statistical moments are not commonly available. In this study, we estimated the bacteriophage lambda (λ) single-cell burst size mean and variance following different intracellular accumulation period durations by employing Escherichia coli lysogens bearing lysis-deficient λ prophages. Single lysogens can be isolated and chemically lysed at desired times following prophage induction to quantify progeny intracellular accumulation within individual cells. Our data showed that λ phage burst size initially increased exponentially with increased lysis time (i.e., period between induction and chemical lysis) and then saturated at longer lysis times. We also demonstrated that cell-to-cell variation, or “noise,” in lysis timing did not contribute significantly to burst size noise. The burst size noise remained constant with increasing mean burst size. The most likely explanation for the experimentally observed constant burst size noise was that cell-to-cell differences in burst size originated from intercellular heterogeneity in cellular capacities to produce phages. The mean burst size measured at different lysis times was positively correlated to cell volume, which may determine the cellular phage production capacity. However, experiments controlling for cell size indicated that there are other factors in addition to cell size that determine this cellular capacity. IMPORTANCE Phages produce offspring by hijacking a cell's replicative machinery. Previously, it was noted that the variation in the number of phages produced by single infected cells far exceeded cell size variation. It was hypothesized that this variation is a consequence of variation in the timing of host cell lysis. Here, we show that cell-to-cell variation in lysis timing does not significantly contribute to the burst size variation. We suggest that the constant burst size variation across different host lysis times results from cell-to-cell differences in capacity to produce phages. We found that the mean burst size measured at different lysis times was positively correlated to cell volume, which may determine the cellular phage production capacity. However, experiments controlling for cell size indicated that there are other factors in addition to cell size that determine this cellular capacity.