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Monitoring Intraspecies Competition in a Bacterial Cell Population by Cocultivation of Fluorescently Labelled Strains
Published on: January 18, 2014
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Slightly beneficial genes are retained by bacteria evolving DNA uptake despite selfish elements
Bram van Dijk1, Paulien Hogeweg1, Hilje M Doekes1
1Utrecht University, Theoretical Biology, Utrecht, Netherlands.
Elife
|May 21, 2020
Summary
Bacteria can evolve costly gene-sharing to retain beneficial genes, even in biofilms. This collective adaptation allows bacteria to acquire new DNA despite risks from selfish genetic elements (SGEs).
Area of Science:
- Microbiology
- Evolutionary Biology
- Computational Biology
Background:
- Bacteria rapidly change gene content via horizontal gene transfer (HGT) and gene loss.
- HGT facilitates adaptation but introduces risks like selfish genetic elements (SGEs).
Purpose of the Study:
- To model the impact of slightly beneficial gene HGT on bacterial population growth rates.
- To investigate if bacterial communities can evolve to accept DNA despite SGEs.
Main Methods:
- Mathematical modeling of bacterial population dynamics.
- Analysis of gene transfer and gene loss under different population structures (well-mixed vs. spatial).
Main Results:
- Identified four classes of slightly beneficial genes: indispensable, enrichable, rescuable, and unrescuable.
- Rescuable genes, beneficial but lost without HGT, can be retained by communities engaging in costly gene-sharing.
- Gene-sharing evolves in spatial populations (biofilms) but not in well-mixed cultures.
- Foreign DNA uptake is evolutionarily maintained, explaining bacterial coexistence with SGEs.
Conclusions:
- Bacterial communities can evolve collective strategies for gene acquisition, particularly in spatial environments like biofilms.
- The risk of SGEs does not prevent the evolution of beneficial HGT, suggesting a balance between adaptation and defense.
Keywords:
collective behaviourcomputational biologydigital evolutionevolutionary biologyhorizontal gene transferin silico evolutionmathematical analysismicrobial communitiesnonesystems biologyMore Related Videos
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