Density-dependent fitness benefits in quorum-sensing bacterial populations.

Journal article

It has been argued that bacteria communicate using small diffusible signal molecules to coordinate, among other things, the production of factors that are secreted outside of the cells in a process known as quorum sensing (QS). The underlying assumption made to explain QS is that the secretion of these extracellular factors is more beneficial at higher cell densities. However, this fundamental assumption has never been tested experimentally. Here, we directly test this by independently manipu...

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Authors: Darch, SE; West, SA; Winzer, K; Diggle, S

• Publication status: Published
• Journal: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
• Volume: 109
• Issue: 21
• Pages: 8259-8263
• Publication date: 2012-05-01
• DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1118131109
• EISSN: 1091-6490
• ISSN: 0027-8424
• Language: English
• Keywords: Microbial Viability; Culture Media; Signal Transduction; Colony Count, Microbial; Pseudomonas aeruginosa; Quorum Sensing