1932

Abstract

Abstract

Our understanding of the social lives of microbes has been revolutionized over the past 20 years. It used to be assumed that bacteria and other microorganisms lived relatively independent unicellular lives, without the cooperative behaviors that have provoked so much interest in mammals, birds, and insects. However, a rapidly expanding body of research has completely overturned this idea, showing that microbes indulge in a variety of social behaviors involving complex systems of cooperation, communication, and synchronization. Work in this area has already provided some elegant experimental tests of social evolutionary theory, demonstrating the importance of factors such as relatedness, kin discrimination, competition between relatives, and enforcement of cooperation. Our aim here is to review these social behaviors, emphasizing the unique opportunities they offer for testing existing evolutionary theory as well as highlighting the novel theoretical problems that they pose.

Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.38.091206.095740
2007-12-01
2024-10-08
Loading full text...

Full text loading...

/content/journals/10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.38.091206.095740
Loading
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.38.091206.095740
Loading

Data & Media loading...

  • Article Type: Review Article
This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was a Success
Invalid data
An Error Occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error