Love Thy Neighbor: Sharing and Cooperativity in the Gut Microbiota.
To persist in the competitive gastrointestinal ecosystem, microbes often enforce selfish strategies that limit resource loss to neighboring bacteria. In contrast, a recent study in Nature by Rakoff-Nahoum et al. (2016) reveals that one commensal bacterium releases nutrients to benefit another species, which reciprocally provides growth-promoting factors to the producer.
University of Michigan Medical School, 1150 West Medical Center Drive, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
Nathan T
NT
Porter
University of Michigan Medical School, 1150 West Medical Center Drive, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA. Electronic address: emartens@umich.edu.
Eric C
EC
Martens
D018407:Bacterial Physiological Phenomena; D005502:Food; D000069196:Gastrointestinal Microbiome / Q000502:physiology*; D041981:Gastrointestinal Tract / Q000382:microbiology*; D006801:Humans; D007444:Inulin / Q000378:metabolism; D013559:Symbiosis
D007444:Inulin