Description du projet
Étudier les bactéries prédatrices
Le projet JAWS, financé par l’UE, vise à étudier les bactéries prédatrices, et en particulier les aspects moléculaires, cellulaires et écologiques du comportement prédateur collectif des bactéries. Le projet se concentrera sur la manière dont Myxococcus xanthus envahit les colonies de proies et se nourrit directement des cellules-proies par suppression contact-dépendante. Il examinera également comment les cellules de Myxococcus se diffusent dans toute la colonie de proies sous forme de vagues concertées pour préparer le prochain cycle de prédation. La méthodologie du projet sera basée sur le développement d’un nouvel outil d’imagerie, Bacto-Hubble, qui capturera l’ensemble du cycle de prédation à une résolution monocellulaire. À terme, le projet doit produire un schéma directeur du cycle de prédation de Myxococcus qui fera la lumière sur d’autres processus multicellulaires de prédation.
Objectif
Predation arguably impacts the evolution and shape of ecological systems. This process occurs at all scales from mammals to viruses. Predatory bacteria remain poorly studied despite their biological importance and often versatile experimental tractability. In this project, we propose to remedy this gap and study the molecular, cellular and ecological aspects of a collective bacterial predatory behavior. Specifically, capitalizing from previous molecular studies on motility, we will investigate how Myxococcus xanthus invades prey colonies and directly feeds on the prey cells by contact-dependent killing. We will then explore how the Myxococcus cells disseminate throughout the prey colony as concerted waves, thus preparing the next predatory cycle. While these experiments will be conducted in laboratory context, we will link molecular mechanisms of predation to ecological dynamics that actually occur in the wild directly by genomic analyses of environmental isolates and experimental evolution of predator-prey interactions. The feasibility of the project is guaranteed by the development of a new imaging tool (Bacto-Hubble) that captures the entire predatory cycle at single cell resolution. In addition, our laboratory recently identified for the first time the Myxococcus genes that promote contact-dependent killing, paving to molecular studies of prey killing and consumption. This project is uniquely multiscale and its realization requires true interdisciplinarity. For this, we will assemble a large collaborative network to connect approaches from the realms of genetics, structural biochemistry, theory and modeling and large-scale genomics. At the end of the project, we expect to obtain a first spatially resolved molecular blueprint of the Myxococcus predatory cycle, which will provide a framework to understand other multicellular predatory processes and well as their evolutionary trajectories.
Champ scientifique
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesgenetics
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesmicrobiologybacteriology
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesecologyecosystems
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesbiological behavioural sciencesethologybiological interactions
- natural sciencesbiological scienceszoologymammalogy
Programme(s)
Thème(s)
Régime de financement
ERC-ADG - Advanced GrantInstitution d’accueil
75794 Paris
France