An aphrodisiac produced byVibrio fischeristimulates mating in the closest living relatives of animals

Abstract

AbstractWe serendipitously discovered that the marine bacteriumVibrio fischeriinduces sexual reproduction in one of the closest living relatives of animals, the choanoflagellateSalpingoeca rosetta. Although bacteria influence everything from nutrition and metabolism to cell biology and development in eukaryotes, bacterial regulation of eukaryotic mating was unexpected. Here we show that a singleV. fischeriprotein, the previously uncharacterized EroS, fully recapitulates the aphrodisiac activity of liveV. fischeri. EroS is a chondroitin lyase; although its substrate, chondroitin sulfate, was previously thought to be an animal synapomorphy, we demonstrate thatS. rosettaproduces chondroitin sulfate and thus extend the ancestry of this important glycosaminoglycan to the premetazoan era. Finally, we show thatV. fischeri, purified EroS, and other bacterial chondroitin lyases induceS. rosettamating at environmentally-relevant concentrations suggesting that bacterially-produced aphrodisiacs likely regulate choanoflagellate mating in nature.