Role of resource allocation and transport in emergence of cross-feeding in microbial consortia

JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY

卷:467

Article

Schepens, Diana^1,2  Carlson, Ross P.¹  Heys, Jeff¹  Beck, Ashley E.^1,3  Gedeon, Tomas¹ 

[1] Montana State Univ, Bozeman, MT 59717 USA

[2] Whitworth Univ, Spokane, WA 99251 USA

[3] North Carolina State Univ, Raleigh, NC 27695 USA

关键词: Chemostat model;    Cooperation;    Metabolite production;   

DOI  :  10.1016/j.jtbi.2019.01.030

来源: Elsevier

【 摘 要 】

Microbial communities that implement mutual cross-feeding are commonly observed in nature and with synthetic constructs in laboratory experiments. A mathematical model of competition in a chemostat is developed to investigate the role that resource allocation and transport of metabolites play in cooperation. The model contains four cell types that differ by whether they produce two, one, or none of two essential metabolites. Producing cell types may export these resources into the environment, and those that do not produce both metabolites must import the missing resource. The contribution to the emergence of a collaborative consortium of single resource producers from the transport rate of these metabolites and the type of transport used by the cell (active vs. passive) is studied. Multiple instances of bi-stability and tri-stability are observed, and the effect of the initial concentration of a non-cooperative cheater cell type on the final outcome of the competition is examined. When the cost of producing metabolites is introduced into the model, significant changes to the outcome of the competition are observed, including coexistence of multiple cell types. (C) 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

【 授权许可】

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