Ecological Populations of Bacteria Act as Socially Cohesive Units of Antibiotic Production and Resistance

Abstract

Toxic Neighborhood Bacterial populations are often considered to be driven by gene-centric, selfish dynamics. Superficially, antibiotic production fits this picture as individuals can gain most benefit by inhibiting or killing close relatives with high niche overlap. Contrary to that notion, Cordero et al. (p. 1228 ; see the Perspective by Morlon ) show that bacteria in the wild form social units in which antibiotic production and resistance leads to cooperation within, and antagonism between, populations. A combination of high-throughput interaction screening, molecular genetics, and genomics revealed that antibiotics are produced by only a few members of each population, while all other members are resistant. In the past, lack of knowledge of the ecological structure of microbial populations has led to interpretations of antibiotic production and resistance as being largely driven by short-lived, cyclic invasions of populations by antibiotic-producing resistant bacteria. This work shows that structured, socially cohesive bacterial populations exist in the wild and form organizational patterns similar to those of animal and plant populations.