Emergence of evolutionary driving forces in pattern-forming microbial populations

Evolutionary dynamics are controlled by a number of driving forces, such as natural selection, random genetic drift and dispersal. In this perspective article, we aim to emphasize that these forces act at the population level, and that it is a challenge to understand how they emerge from the stochas...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B. Biological sciences 2018-05, Vol.373 (1747), p.20170106-20170106
Main Authors: Kayser, Jona, Schreck, Carl F., Yu, QinQin, Gralka, Matti, Hallatschek, Oskar
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Bacteria - growth & development
Biological Evolution
Biology
Cell Communication
Cell interactions
Cell–cell Interactions
Dispersal
Evolution
Forming
Genetic Drift
Microbial Evolution
Microorganisms
Natural Selection
Pattern Formation
Review
Selection, Genetic
Spatial Structure
Stochasticity
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Summary:Evolutionary dynamics are controlled by a number of driving forces, such as natural selection, random genetic drift and dispersal. In this perspective article, we aim to emphasize that these forces act at the population level, and that it is a challenge to understand how they emerge from the stochastic and deterministic behaviour of individual cells. Even the most basic steric interactions between neighbouring cells can couple evolutionary outcomes of otherwise unrelated individuals, thereby weakening natural selection and enhancing random genetic drift. Using microbial examples of varying degrees of complexity, we demonstrate how strongly cell–cell interactions influence evolutionary dynamics, especially in pattern-forming systems. As pattern formation itself is subject to evolution, we propose to study the feedback between pattern formation and evolutionary dynamics, which could be key to predicting and potentially steering evolutionary processes. Such an effort requires extending the systems biology approach from the cellular to the population scale. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Self-organization in cell biology’.
ISSN:0962-8436
1471-2970
DOI:10.1098/rstb.2017.0106