Intracellular Competitions Reveal Determinants of Plasmid Evolutionary Success.

ABSTRACT: Plasmids are autonomously replicating genetic elements that are ubiquitous in all taxa and habitats where they constitute an integral part of microbial genomes. The stable inheritance of plasmids depends on their segregation during cell division and their long-term persistence in a host population is thought to largely depend on their impact on the host fitness. Nonetheless, many plasmids found in nature are lacking a clear trait that is advantageous to their host; the determinants of plasmid evolutionary success in the absence of plasmid benefit to the host remain understudied. Here we show that stable plasmid inheritance is an important determinant of plasmid evolutionary success. Borrowing terminology from evolutionary biology of cellular living forms, we hypothesize that Darwinian fitn

SUBMITTER: Hulter NF 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7500096 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature