ArticleNature communications2020
Dead cells release a 'necrosignal' that activates antibiotic survival pathways in bacterial swarms.
Article in Nature communications, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 40 papers.
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Who cites it
40 citing papers in PubMed, 75 citations in OpenAlex.
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- A review of research progress on periplasmic adaptor proteins in bacterial tripartite pumps.Frontiers in microbiology · 2026Review
- RND efflux pump inhibitor-like natural products as antibiotic adjuvants against multidrug-resistant gram-negative bacteria: a graded-evidence review.Frontiers in microbiology · 2026Review
- Global transcriptomics and targeted metabolite analysis reveal the involvement of the AcrAB efflux pump in physiological functions by exporting signaling molecules inMicrobiology spectrum · 2025Article
- Population-Level Dynamics and Community-Mediated Resistance to Antimicrobial Peptides.Biomolecules · 2025Review
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- Mechanisms conferring bacterial cell wall variability and adaptivity.Biochemical Society transactions · 2024Review
- Flagellar protein FliL: A many-splendored thing.Molecular microbiology · 2024Review
- Deciphering the influence of NaCl on social behaviour ofRoyal Society open science · 2024Article
- How Bacteria Cope with Oxidative Stress Induced by Cadmium: Volatile Communication Is Differentially Perceived among Strains.Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Influence of Dead Cells Killed by Industrial Biocides (BAC and DBNPA) on Biofilm Formation.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Single Phototrophic Bacterium-Mediated Iron Cycling in Aquatic Environments.Research (Washington, D.C.) · 2024Article
- A heritable iron memory enables decision-making inProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2023Article
- Polycation-Intercalated MXene Membrane with Enhanced Permselective and Anti-Microbial Properties.Nanomaterials (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- Bacterial motility can govern the dynamics of antibiotic resistance evolution.Nature communications · 2023Article
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3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
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Abstract
Swarming is a form of collective bacterial motion enabled by flagella on the surface of semi-solid media. Swarming populations exhibit non-genetic or adaptive resistance to antibiotics, despite sustaining considerable cell death. Here, we show that antibiotic-induced death of a sub-population benefits the swarm by enhancing adaptive resistance in the surviving cells. Killed cells release a resistance-enhancing factor that we identify as AcrA, a periplasmic component of RND efflux pumps. The released AcrA interacts on the surface of live cells with an outer membrane component of the efflux pump, TolC, stimulating drug efflux and inducing expression of other efflux pumps. This phenomenon, which we call 'necrosignaling', exists in other Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria and displays species-specificity. Given that adaptive resistance is a known incubator for evolving genetic resistance, our findings might be clinically relevant to the rise of multidrug resistance.
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