Constrained optimal foraging by marine bacterioplankton on particulate organic matter.

ABSTRACT: Optimal foraging theory provides a framework to understand how organisms balance the benefits of harvesting resources within a patch with the sum of the metabolic, predation, and missed opportunity costs of foraging. Here, we show that, after accounting for the limited environmental information available to microorganisms, optimal foraging theory and, in particular, patch use theory also applies to the behavior of marine bacteria in particle seascapes. Combining modeling and experiments, we find that the marine bacterium Vibrio ordalii optimizes nutrient uptake by rapidly switching between attached and planktonic lifestyles, departing particles when their nutrient concentration is more than hundredfold higher than background. In accordance with predictions from patch use theory, sin

SUBMITTER: Yawata Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7568300 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature