Bacterial coexistence driven by motility and spatial competition

Sebastian Gude, Erçağ Pinçe, Katja M. Taute, Anne-Bart Seinen, Thomas S. Shimizu () and Sander J. Tans ()
Additional contact information
Sebastian Gude: AMOLF
Erçağ Pinçe: AMOLF
Katja M. Taute: AMOLF
Anne-Bart Seinen: AMOLF
Thomas S. Shimizu: AMOLF
Sander J. Tans: AMOLF

Nature, 2020, vol. 578, issue 7796, 588-592

Abstract: Abstract Elucidating elementary mechanisms that underlie bacterial diversity is central to ecology1,2 and microbiome research3. Bacteria are known to coexist by metabolic specialization4, cooperation5 and cyclic warfare6–8. Many species are also motile9, which is studied in terms of mechanism10,11, benefit12,13, strategy14,15, evolution16,17 and ecology18,19. Indeed, bacteria often compete for nutrient patches that become available periodically or by random disturbances2,20,21. However, the role of bacterial motility in coexistence remains unexplored experimentally. Here we show that—for mixed bacterial populations that colonize nutrient patches—either population outcompetes the other when low in relative abundance. This inversion of the competitive hierarchy is caused by active segregation and spatial exclusion within the patch: a small fast-moving population can outcompete a large fast-growing population by impeding its migration into the patch, while a small fast-growing population can outcompete a large fast-moving population by expelling it from the initial contact area. The resulting spatial segregation is lost for weak growth–migration trade-offs and a lack of virgin space, but is robust to population ratio, density and chemotactic ability, and is observed in both laboratory and wild strains. These findings show that motility differences and their trade-offs with growth are sufficient to promote diversity, and suggest previously undescribed roles for motility in niche formation and collective expulsion–containment strategies beyond individual search and survival.

Date: 2020
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2033-2 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:nature:v:578:y:2020:i:7796:d:10.1038_s41586-020-2033-2

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/

DOI: 10.1038/s41586-020-2033-2

Access Statistics for this article

Nature is currently edited by Magdalena Skipper

More articles in Nature from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().