ArticlePLoS biology2013
Cooperation and the fate of microbial societies.
Article in PLoS biology, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers.
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Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed.
- Ecological and stochastic determinants of the growth and persistence of the oral pathogen Porphyromonas gingivalis.NPJ systems biology and applications · 2026Article
- Ecological and Stochastic Determinants of the Growth and Persistence of the Oral Pathogen Porphyromonas gingivalis.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Increased privatization of a public resource leads to spread of cooperation in a microbial population.Microbiology spectrum · 2024Article
- Public good-driven release of heterogeneous resources leads to genotypic diversification of an isogenic yeast population.Evolution; international journal of organic evolution · 2022Article
- The role of the brain-gut-microbiota axis in psychology: The importance of considering gut microbiota in the development, perpetuation, and treatment of psychological disorders.Brain and behavior · 2019Review
- Nutrient Exchange of Carbon and Nitrogen Promotes the Formation of Stable Mutualisms BetweenFrontiers in microbiology · 2019Article
- Microbial Group Dynamics in Plant Rhizospheres and Their Implications on Nutrient Cycling.Frontiers in microbiology · 2018Article
- Exploring bacterial interspecific interactions for discovery of novel antimicrobial compounds.Microbial biotechnology · 2017Article
- A passive mutualistic interaction promotes the evolution of spatial structure within microbial populations.BMC evolutionary biology · 2017Article
- Cooperators trade off ecological resilience and evolutionary stability in public goods games.Journal of the Royal Society, Interface · 2017Article
- Article
- The effect of phylogenetically different bacteria on the fitness of Pseudomonas fluorescens in sand microcosms.PloS one · 2015Article
- First principles of Hamiltonian medicine.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2014Article
- Eco-evolutionary dynamics of complex social strategies in microbial communities.Communicative & integrative biology · 2014Review
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2 authors.
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No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Microorganisms have been cooperating with each other for billions of years: by sharing resources, communicating with each other, and joining together to form biofilms and other large structures. These cooperative behaviors benefit the colony as a whole; however, they may be costly to the individuals performing them. This raises the question of how such cooperation can arise from natural selection. Mathematical modeling is one important avenue for exploring this question. Evolutionary experiments are another, providing us with an opportunity to see evolutionary dynamics in action and allowing us to test predictions arising from mathematical models. A new study in this issue of PLOS Biology investigates the evolution of a cooperative resource-sharing behavior in yeast. Examining the competition between cooperating and "cheating" strains of yeast, the authors find that, depending on the initial mix of strains, this yeast society either evolves toward a stable coexistence or collapses for lack of cooperation. Using a simple mathematical model, they show how these dynamics arise from eco-evolutionary feedback, where changes in the frequencies of strains are coupled with changes in population size. This study and others illustrate the combined power of modeling and experiment to elucidate the origins of cooperation and other fundamental questions in evolutionary biology.
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