Human symbionts inject and neutralize antibacterial toxins to persist in the gut.

ABSTRACT: The human gut microbiome is a dynamic and densely populated microbial community that can provide important benefits to its host. Cooperation and competition for nutrients among its constituents only partially explain community composition and interpersonal variation. Notably, certain human-associated Bacteroidetes--one of two major phyla in the gut--also encode machinery for contact-dependent interbacterial antagonism, but its impact within gut microbial communities remains unknown. Here we report that prominent human gut symbionts persist in the gut through continuous attack on their immediate neighbors. Our analysis of just one of the hundreds of species in these communities reveals 12 candidate antibacterial effector loci that can exist in 32 combinations. Through the use of secretome s

SUBMITTER: Wexler AG 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4822603 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature