ArticleNature microbiology2021
Metabolic cooperation and spatiotemporal niche partitioning in a kefir microbial community.
Article in Nature microbiology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 122 papers.
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.
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.
Who cites it
122 citing papers in PubMed, 286 citations in OpenAlex.
- Peptidome and Metabolome Profiling of Fermented Milk Products Reveal Accumulation of Bioactive Compounds During Cold Storage.Current issues in molecular biology · 2026Article
- Unveiling the Acidic Backbone of Baijiu: A Comprehensive Review on Composition, Metabolic Pathways, and Quality Implications.Comprehensive reviews in food science and food safety · 2026Review
- Decoding microbial metabolic complementarity from individual traits to community structuring.Ecology · 2026Article
- Obligate cross-feeding of metabolites is common in soil microbial communities.Nature microbiology · 2026Article
- Niche Construction: A Rational Engineering Strategy for Regulating Microbial Assembly to Enhance Flavor and Bioactivity of Fermented Foods.Comprehensive reviews in food science and food safety · 2026Review
- Common xenobiotics modulate gut microbial responses to low‑calorie sweeteners in vitro.Molecular systems biology · 2026Article
- Beyond omics: From descriptive profiling to causal and scalable design of fermentation microbiomes.iMeta · 2026Article
- Functional and ecological drivers of bacterial interactions in glacier-fed stream biofilms.mSystems · 2026Article
- Traditional fermented food microbial ecosystems oriented towards industrial standards: multi-dimensional characterization and artificial regulation.NPJ science of food · 2026Review
- Genome-Scale Metabolic Models Guided Improvement of Fermented Milk Quality and Flavor byFoods (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Species sorting shapes the divergence of a traditional fermented dairy-derived bacterial community with repeatable functionality during propagation with alternative substrates.World journal of microbiology & biotechnology · 2026Article
- Cooperative traits maintain bacterial niche breadth.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- A microbiome catalog of Chinese traditional artisanal cheeses provides insights into functional and microbial diversity.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Bacteria and Fungi Synergistically Reprogram Flavonoid Metabolites in the Pericarp of Citrus Reticulata 'Chachi' During Storage.Advanced science (Weinheim, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany) · 2026Article
- Fermentation method outweighs geographic origin in shaping kefir'sFood chemistry: X · 2026Article
- Eco-Microbiology: A Frugal-Circular Framework for Biosafe, Low-Cost Practical Microbiology in Secondary Education.Microbial biotechnology · 2026Review
- Microbial Fermentation as a Tool to Improve the Antioxidant and Functional Value of Milk Products.Foods (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Microbial biotechnology meets ecological theory: a unified framework to design industrial microbial consortia.International microbiology : the official journal of the Spanish Society for Microbiology · 2026Review
- Lactobacilli biology, applications and host interactions.Nature reviews. Microbiology · 2026Review
- Environmental complexity shapes maintenance of bacterial diversity through context-dependent interactions among niche axes.The ISME journal · 2026Article
62 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
14 authors at 5 institutions in 5 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Microbial communities often undergo intricate compositional changes yet also maintain stable coexistence of diverse species. The mechanisms underlying long-term coexistence remain unclear as system-wide studies have been largely limited to engineered communities, ex situ adapted cultures or synthetic assemblies. Here, we show how kefir, a natural milk-fermenting community of prokaryotes (predominantly lactic and acetic acid bacteria) and yeasts (family Saccharomycetaceae), realizes stable coexistence through spatiotemporal orchestration of species and metabolite dynamics. During milk fermentation, kefir grains (a polysaccharide matrix synthesized by kefir microorganisms) grow in mass but remain unchanged in composition. In contrast, the milk is colonized in a sequential manner in which early members open the niche for the followers by making available metabolites such as amino acids and lactate. Through metabolomics, transcriptomics and large-scale mapping of inter-species interactions, we show how microorganisms poorly suited for milk survive in-and even dominate-the community, through metabolic cooperation and uneven partitioning between grain and milk. Overall, our findings reveal how inter-species interactions partitioned in space and time lead to stable coexistence.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
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.