Chemotactic preferences govern competition and pattern formation in simulated two-strain microbial communities.

ABSTRACT: Substrate competition is a common mode of microbial interaction in natural environments. While growth properties play an important and well-studied role in competition, we here focus on the influence of motility. In a simulated two-strain community populating a homogeneous two-dimensional environment, strains competed for a common substrate and only differed in their chemotactic preference, either responding more sensitively to a chemoattractant excreted by themselves or responding more sensitively to substrate. Starting from homogeneous distributions, three possible behaviors were observed depending on the competitors' chemotactic preferences: (i) distributions remained homogeneous, (ii) patterns formed but dissolved at a later time point, resulting in a shifted community composition, and

SUBMITTER: Centler F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4313714 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature