ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2006
The Bacillus subtilis spore coat provides "eat resistance" during phagocytic predation by the protozoan Tetrahymena thermophila.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2006. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 73 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
73 citing papers in PubMed, 144 citations in OpenAlex.
- Predation in microbial communities: gradients of nutritive killing.Nature reviews. Microbiology · 2026Review
- Lives in a gram of soil: linking life cycle biology to soil ecology.The ISME journal · 2026Review
- Alliances and competitions between nematodes and other micro-organisms occurring in the soil biosphere: a review.Frontiers in plant science · 2026Review
- Inactivated Bacillus subtilis R0179 Inhibits Porphyromonas Gingivalis-Induced Gingival Inflammation Via TLR2/NF-κB Signaling in a Murine Model of Periodontitis.Inflammation · 2025Article
- Article
- To Sporulate or Not to Sporulate: Developmental Checkpoints MonitoringAnnual review of microbiology · 2025Review
- Article
- Real-time nanoscale investigation of spore coat assembly in Bacillus subtilis.Communications biology · 2025Article
- Effects of Aqua-Glycerol Uptake Facilitator Protein GlpF on Spore Germination ofFoods (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Embedding a ribonuclease in the spore crust couples gene expression to spore development in Bacillus subtilis.Nucleic acids research · 2025Article
- Bacillus subtilis ensures high spore quality in competition with Salmonella Typhimurium via the SigB-dependent pathway.The ISME journal · 2025Article
- Enzyme-displaying spores as a novel strategy for mixed fiber textile recycling.Frontiers in systems biology · 2025Review
- Enhancing catalytic efficiency of Bacillus subtilis laccase BsCotA through active site pocket design.Applied microbiology and biotechnology · 2024Article
- Bacteria-phage coevolution with a seed bank.The ISME journal · 2023Article
- New Thoughts on an Old Topic: Secrets of Bacterial Spore Resistance Slowly Being Revealed.Microbiology and molecular biology reviews : MMBR · 2023Review
- Phage-Encoded Sigma Factors Alter Bacterial Dormancy.mSphere · 2022Article
- Proteomic Response ofFoods (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Article
- Specialized Metabolite-Mediated Predation Defense in the Marine ActinobacteriumApplied and environmental microbiology · 2022Article
- What's new and notable in bacterial spore killing!World journal of microbiology & biotechnology · 2021Review
- Biofilm Dispersal for Spore Release in Bacillus subtilis.Journal of bacteriology · 2021Article
13 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Bacillus spores are highly resistant to many environmental stresses, owing in part to the presence of multiple "extracellular" layers. Although the role of some of these extracellular layers in resistance to particular stresses is known, the function of one of the outermost layers, the spore coat, is not completely understood. This study sought to determine whether the spore coat plays a role in resistance to predation by the ciliated protozoan Tetrahymena, which uses phagocytosis to ingest and degrade other microorganisms. Wild-type dormant spores of Bacillus subtilis were efficiently ingested by the protozoan Tetrahymena thermophila but were neither digested nor killed. However, spores with various coat defects were killed and digested, leaving only an outer shell termed a rind, and supporting the growth of Tetrahymena. A similar rind was generated when coat-defective spores were treated with lysozyme alone. The sensitivity of spores with different coat defects to predation by T. thermophila paralleled the spores' sensitivities to lysozyme. Spore killing by T. thermophila was by means of lytic enzymes within the protozoal phagosome, not by initial spore germination followed by killing. These findings suggest that a major function of the coat of spores of Bacillus species is to protect spores against predation. We also found that indigestible rinds were generated even from spores in which cross-linking of coat proteins was greatly reduced, implying the existence of a coat structure that is highly resistant to degradative enzymes.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.