Metabolic heterogeneity in clonal microbial populations.

Metabolic heterogeneity in clonal microbial populations.
Curr Opin Microbiol. 2018 Feb 21;45:30-38
Authors: Takhaveev V, Heinemann M
Abstract
In the past decades, numerous instances of phenotypic diversity were observed in clonal microbial populations, particularly, on the gene expression level. Much less is, however, known about phenotypic differences that occur on the level of metabolism. This is likely explained by the fact that experimental tools probing metabolism of single cells are still at an early stage of development. Here, we review recent exciting discoveries that point out different causes for metabolic heterogeneity within clonal microbial populations. These causes range from ecological factors and cell-inherent dynamics in constant environments to molecular noise in gene expression that propagates into metabolism. Furthermore, we provide an overview of current methods to quantify the levels of metabolites and biomass components in single cells.
PMID: 29477028 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

Source: Current Opinion in Microbiology - February 21, 2018 Category: Microbiology Authors: Takhaveev V, Heinemann M Tags: Curr Opin Microbiol Source Type: research