title: Adaptability of non-genetic diversity in bacterial chemotaxis.
abstract: Bacterial chemotaxis systems are as diverse as the environments that bacteria inhabit, but how much environmental variation can cells tolerate with a single system? Diversification of a single chemotaxis system could serve as an alternative, or even evolutionary stepping-stone, to switching between multiple systems. We hypothesized that mutations in gene regulation could lead to heritable control of chemotactic diversity. By simulating foraging and colonization of E. coli using a single-cell chemotaxis model, we found that different environments selected for different behaviors. The resulting trade-offs show that populations facing diverse environments would ideally diversify behaviors when time for navigation is limited. We show that advantageous diversity can arise from changes in the distribution of protein levels among individuals, which could occur through mutations in gene regulation. We propose experiments to test our prediction that chemotactic diversity in a clonal population could be a selectable trait that enables adaptation to environmental variability.
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology, Yale University, New Haven, United States.
authors.forename: Nicholas W
authors.initials: NW
authors.lastname: Frankel
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Yale University, New Haven, United States.
authors.forename: William
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Pontius
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology, Yale University, New Haven, United States.
authors.forename: Yann S
authors.initials: YS
authors.lastname: Dufour
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Yale University, New Haven, United States.
authors.forename: Junjiajia
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Long
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Yale University, New Haven, United States.
authors.forename: Luis
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Hernandez-Nunez
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Yale University, New Haven, United States.
authors.forename: Thierry
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Emonet
mesh_terms: D000222:Adaptation, Physiological / Q000235:genetics*; D001426:Bacterial Proteins / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism; D005075:Biological Evolution; D002633:Chemotaxis / Q000235:genetics*; D002999:Clone Cells; D004926:Escherichia coli / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism; D015964:Gene Expression Regulation, Bacterial; D015233:Models, Statistical; D010641:Phenotype; D012641:Selection, Genetic; D059010:Single-Cell Analysis; D013269:Stochastic Processes
chemical_list: D001426:Bacterial Proteins
keywords: E. coli; chemotaxis; ecology; fitness trade-offs; infectious disease; microbiology; phenotypic diversity