Evidence map›Paper›PMID 31138071›Full record

ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences2019

Functional amyloids promote retention of public goods in bacteria.

John B Bruce, Stuart A West, Ashleigh S Griffin

Open access · bronzeAbstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
8citing papers in PubMed
1.3field-weighted citation impact, top 22% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

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.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

8 citing papers in PubMed, 8 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. How social is social resistance?Essays in biochemistry · 2026
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4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.

John B BruceDepartment of Zoology, University of Oxford , Oxford , UK.
Stuart A WestDepartment of Zoology, University of Oxford , Oxford , UK.
Ashleigh S GriffinDepartment of Zoology, University of Oxford , Oxford , UK.
University of Oxford · GB

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The growth and virulence of bacteria depends upon a number of factors that are secreted into the environment. These factors can diffuse away from the producing cells, to be either lost or used by cells that do not produce them (cheats). Mechanisms that act to reduce the loss of secreted factors through diffusion are expected to be favoured. One such mechanism may be the production of Fap fibrils, needle-like fibres on the cell surface observed in P. aeruginosa, which can transiently bind several secreted metabolites produced by cells. We test whether Fap fibrils help retain a secreted factor, the iron-scavenging molecule pyoverdine, and hence reduce the potential for exploitation by non-producing, cheating cells. We found that: (i) wild-type cells retain more iron-chelating metabolites than fibril non-producers; (ii) purified Fap fibrils can prevent the loss of the iron-chelators PQS ( Pseudomonas quinolone signal) and pyoverdine; and (iii) pyoverdine non-producers have higher fitness in competition with fibril non-producers than with wild-type cells. Our results suggest that by limiting the loss of a costly public good, Fap fibrils may play an important role in stabilizing cooperative production of secreted factors.

Indexed as

AmyloidBacterial ProteinsIronOligopeptidesPseudomonas aeruginosaSiderophoresAmyloidBacterial ProteinsIronOligopeptidespyoverdinSiderophorescooperationfunctional amyloidPseudomonaspyoverdinesocial evolution

Identifiers

PMID31138071
PMCPMC6545082
OpenAlexW2947677780

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

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.