Journal article
Antibiotic production in Streptomyces is organized by a division of labor through terminal genomic differentiation
- Abstract:
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One of the hallmark behaviors of social groups is division of labor, where different group members become specialized to carry out complementary tasks. By dividing labor, cooperative groups increase efficiency, thereby raising group fitness even if these behaviors reduce individual fitness. We find that antibiotic production in colonies of Streptomyces coelicolor is coordinated by a division of labor. We show that S. coelicolor colonies are genetically heterogeneous because of amplifications and deletions to the chromosome. Cells with chromosomal changes produce diversified secondary metabolites and secrete more antibiotics; however, these changes reduced individual fitness, providing evidence for a trade-off between antibiotic production and fitness. Last, we show that colonies containing mixtures of mutants and their parents produce significantly more antibiotics, while colony-wide spore production remains unchanged. By generating specialized mutants that hyper-produce antibiotics, streptomycetes reduce the fitness costs of secreted secondary metabolites while maximizing the yield and diversity of these products.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 589.1KB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.1126/sciadv.aay5781
Authors
- Publisher:
- American Association for the Advancement of Science
- Journal:
- Science Advances More from this journal
- Volume:
- 6
- Issue:
- 3
- Article number:
- eaay5781
- Publication date:
- 2020-01-15
- Acceptance date:
- 2019-11-14
- DOI:
- EISSN:
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2375-2548
- Pmid:
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31998842
- Language:
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English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
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1161089
- Local pid:
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pubs:1161089
- Deposit date:
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2023-08-11
- ARK identifier:
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Zhang et al.
- Copyright date:
- 2020
- Rights statement:
- Copyright © 2020 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial License 4.0 (CC BY-NC). This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license, which permits use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, so long as the resultant use is not for commercial advantage and provided the original work is properly cited.
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