Extensive cellular multitasking within Bacillus subtilis biofilms [preprint]
Authors
Yannarell, Sarah M.Beaudoin, Eric S.
Talley, Hunter S.
Schoenborn, Alexi A.
Orr, Galya
Anderton, Christopher R.
Chrisler, William B.
Shank, Elizabeth A
Document Type
PreprintPublication Date
2022-09-03
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Bacillus subtilis is a soil-dwelling bacterium that can form biofilms, or communities of cells surrounded by a self-produced extracellular matrix. In biofilms, genetically identical cells often exhibit heterogeneous transcriptional phenotypes so that only subpopulations of cells carry out essential yet costly cellular processes that allow the entire community to thrive. Surprisingly, the extent of phenotypic heterogeneity and the relationships between subpopulations of cells within biofilms of even in well-studied bacterial systems like B. subtilis remains largely unknown. To determine relationships between these subpopulations of cells, we created 182 strains containing pairwise combinations of fluorescent transcriptional reporters for the expression state of 14 different genes associated with potential cellular subpopulations. We determined the spatial organization of the expression of these genes within biofilms using confocal microscopy, which revealed that many reporters localized to distinct areas of the biofilm, some of which were co-localized. We used flow cytometry to quantify reporter co-expression, which revealed that many cells ‘multi-task’, simultaneously expressing two reporters. These data indicate that prior models describing B. subtilis cells as differentiating into specific cell-types, each with a specific task or function, were oversimplified. Only a few subpopulations of cells, including surfactin and plipastatin producers, as well as sporulating and competent cells, appear to have distinct roles based on the set of genes examined here. These data will provide us with a framework with which to further study and make predictions about the roles of diverse cell phenotypes in B. subtilis biofilms. IMPORTANCE Many microbes differentiate, expressing diverse phenotypes to ensure their survival in various environments. However, studies on phenotypic differentiation have typically examined only a few phenotypes at one time, thus limiting our knowledge about the extent of differentiation and phenotypic overlap in the population. We investigated the spatial organization and gene expression relationships for genes important in B. subtilis biofilms. In doing so, we mapped spatial gene expression patterns and expanded the number of cell populations described in the B. subtilis literature. It is likely that other bacteria also display complex differentiation patterns within their biofilms. Studying the extent of cellular differentiation in other microbes may be important when designing therapies for disease-causing bacteria, where studying only a single phenotype may be masking underlying phenotypic differentiation relevant to infection outcomes.Source
Extensive cellular multitasking within Bacillus subtilis biofilms Sarah M. Yannarell, Eric S. Beaudoin, Hunter S. Talley, Alexi A. Schoenborn, Galya Orr, Christopher R. Anderton, William B. Chrisler, Elizabeth A Shank bioRxiv 2022.09.02.506450; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.09.02.506450DOI
10.1101/2022.09.02.506450Permanent Link to this Item
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14038/51525Notes
This article is a preprint. Preprints are preliminary reports of work that have not been certified by peer review.Rights
The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license.; Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 InternationalDistribution License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1101/2022.09.02.506450
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Except where otherwise noted, this item's license is described as The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license.; Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International