Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Roman Zapien-Campos, Michael Sieber, Arne Traulsen
Summary: Theoretical models are useful for understanding the drivers of community dynamics. In the case of neutral models, the predictions may not be robust to type-specific rates. Large immigration and biodiversity can lead to the occurrence-abundance pattern regardless of neutral or non-neutral rates.
JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY INTERFACE
(2022)
Article
Ecology
Mayumi Seto, Michio Kondoh
Summary: Microbial life in low-energy ecosystems relies on individual energy conservation and optimizing energy use in response to competition and mutualistic interactions. A new community-level strategy for increasing energy use efficiency is proposed, which involves microbial functional diversity and metabolic handoffs. The mutualistic division of labour and complexity of redox pathways promote material cycling and energy exploitation. These findings have important implications for microbial ecosystem functioning and the co-evolution of life and Earth.
Review
Ecology
Jeremy M. Chacon, Sarah P. Hammarlund, Jonathan N. V. Martinson, Leno B. Smith, William R. Harcombe
Summary: Mutually beneficial interspecific interactions, including those between microbes, play a critical role in human health and global nutrient cycling. Studying model microbial mutualisms in laboratory settings allows for controlled experiments to develop and test evolutionary and ecological hypotheses. This research provides insights into the evolutionary origins, dynamics, and ecological features of microbial mutualism, while also highlighting gaps in understanding and open questions for future study.
ANNUAL REVIEW OF ECOLOGY, EVOLUTION, AND SYSTEMATICS, VOL 52, 2021
(2021)
Article
Microbiology
Xiao-Lin Chu, Quan-Guo Zhang, Angus Buckling, Meaghan Castledine
Summary: Our study found that increasing diversity in competitive communities leads to increased morphological diversity in focal species by impeding the domination of a single morphotype. More diverse communities are more likely to contain key species that occupy the same niche as otherwise competitively superior morphotypes, thus preventing competitive exclusion within the focal species.
FRONTIERS IN MICROBIOLOGY
(2021)
Review
Microbiology
Ryan K. Fritts, Alexandra L. McCully, James B. McKinlay
Summary: The transfer of nutrients between cells, known as cross-feeding, is a crucial aspect of microbial communities that impacts health and global biogeochemical cycles. Externalized molecules play a diverse role in promoting cross-feeding relationships, which can be characterized by a mix of cooperation and competition. The interplay between microbial physiology, environmental factors, and extracellular molecules shape the dynamics of cross-feeding interactions.
MICROBIOLOGY AND MOLECULAR BIOLOGY REVIEWS
(2021)
Article
Ecology
Kimberly A. Lato, Matthew Fuirst, Richard R. Veit, Lesley H. Thorne
Summary: Urban habitats can create empty trophic niche space, allowing generalist species to shift or expand their trophic niches. However, the effects on interspecific interactions and competition in peri-urban systems are less clear. This study found that peri-urban environments can facilitate trophic niche expansion and decrease niche overlap in mobile generalist species. These results highlight the importance of studying how peri-urban systems influence wildlife to understand the impact of urbanization on ecosystem structures.
Article
Biology
Damien Charabidze, Cindy Aubernon
Summary: The larvae of blowfly species grow on carcasses and actively aggregate. They can reduce development time through thermoregulation or aggregation. The settlement order of species strongly affects self-organization and mixed-species group formation.
PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY B-BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
(2023)
Article
Green & Sustainable Science & Technology
Sanna Wickerts, Rickard Arvidsson, Anders Nordelof, Magdalena Svanstrom, Patrik Johansson
Summary: This study conducted a prospective life cycle assessment on two different sodium-ion battery cells and found that they have lower mineral resource scarcity impacts compared to lithium-ion battery cells. The study recommends sourcing fossil-free electricity for cell production, using hard carbon anodes based on lignin, and further research on SIB electrolyte materials with low environmental and resource impacts.
JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL ECOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Ecology
Daniela de Angeli Dutra, Gabriel Moreira Felix, Robert Poulin
Summary: The geographical and environmental ranges of parasites are negatively associated with their host specificity and their local abundance. Local abundance restricts the geographical and environmental ranges of parasites, indicating a trade-off between these traits that becomes evident when considering heterogeneous host communities.
GLOBAL ECOLOGY AND BIOGEOGRAPHY
(2021)
Review
Microbiology
Bryden Fields, Ville-Petri Friman
Summary: Microbial communities play a crucial role in plant health and productivity, and the rapid evolution of microbes in the rhizosphere has significant impacts on the ecological dynamics within and between plant generations. Understanding how evolution shapes the plant-microbe ecosystem functioning and recognizing the importance of intraspecies diversity are essential in harnessing the benefits of soil microbes for sustainable agriculture.
CURRENT OPINION IN MICROBIOLOGY
(2022)
Review
Ecology
Joe Wan, Thomas W. Crowther
Summary: Below-ground microbial communities play a significant role in earth's biogeochemical fluxes. This review discusses recent advances in trait-based soil carbon modeling and highlights the challenges and methods in integrating different scales of microbial biogeochemical modeling.
FUNCTIONAL ECOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Microbiology
Sandra Dedrick, Vaishnavi Warrier, Katherine P. Lemon, Babak Momeni
Summary: To accurately predict outcomes of microbial community manipulation, an accurate modeling framework is needed. By conducting in vitro experiments using cell-free spent medium, researchers can determine if the commonly used Lotka-Volterra (LV) model is appropriate for describing microbial interactions. The study shows that LV can be a good approximation for low-nutrient and complex environments. These findings help clarify the applicability of LV models for predictive modeling of microbial communities.
Article
Biology
Hong Jhun Sim, Weng Ngai Lam, Ryan A. Chisholm, Kwek Yan Chong
Summary: This study investigates the stress-gradient hypothesis (SGH) in the context of consumer-resource interactions. The outcomes suggest that the specific algebraic forms of the functional responses do not affect the long-term behavior of the system, and the SGH holds only under specific conditions.
JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY
(2022)
Review
Dentistry, Oral Surgery & Medicine
Laura Bustos-Lobato, Maria J. Rus, Carlos Sauco, Aurea Simon-Soro
Summary: Sjogren's syndrome (SS) is an autoimmune disease that primarily affects the salivary glands. The oral microbiome, specifically the abundance of Gram-positive species, may play a role in the onset and development of the disease. Reduced salivary flow is influenced by both dysbiosis and host-associated risk factors.
MOLECULAR ORAL MICROBIOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Biodiversity Conservation
Zoie C. Lopez, Maren L. Friesen, Eric Von Wettberg, Leslie New, Stephanie Porter
Summary: The availability of compatible rhizobia limits the spread of an invasive legume at both small and large spatial scales, leading to decreased fitness and nitrogen fixation in the legumes.
BIOLOGICAL INVASIONS
(2021)
Article
Biology
Yuki Kanayama, Yoh Iwasa
Summary: Research using life history theory explains the large body size of sauropod dinosaurs. The analysis showed that adult body size increased with food-plant quality and availability but decreased with higher mortality due to predators.
JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY
(2021)
Article
Biology
Sachi Yamaguchi, Yoh Iwasa
Summary: Androdioecy, the coexistence of hermaphrodites and males, is rare in vertebrates, but occurs in mangrove killifish. The advantages of outcrossing-oriented hermaphrodites and the production of males strongly affect each other. Different models are studied to explain the discrepancy between the predicted high male fraction and the observed low male fraction.
JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY
(2021)
Article
Biology
Ryota Kobayashi, Sachi Yamaguchi, Yoh Iwasa
Summary: Root nodules in legumes play a beneficial role in increasing leaf nitrogen content, accelerating plant growth rate, and reducing soil nutrient concentration.
JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY
(2021)
Article
Biology
Yoh Iwasa, Sachi Yamaguchi
Summary: In species with separate sexes, males provide nuptial gifts containing nutrition to their mates, which can affect the male's reproductive success and bring direct and indirect benefits to the female. By formalizing and analyzing a quantitative genetics model describing the coevolution of nuptial gift size and female's propensity to remate, it was found that various evolutionary equilibriums exist, including scenarios with no nuptial gifts or remating, as well as scenarios where males produce nuptial gifts and females engage in multiple matings.
JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Behavioral Sciences
Yoh Iwasa, Sachi Yamaguchi
Summary: This study investigated the reasons why subordinate individuals in most sex-changing fishes choose to be female or are forced to give up their male function, finding that subordinates are only evicted by dominant males when there is a significant difference in reproductive resources.
BEHAVIORAL ECOLOGY AND SOCIOBIOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Biology
Yuka Uchiyama, Yoh Iwasa, Sachi Yamaguchi
Summary: This study developed a dynamic optimization model to investigate the chloride cell composition of individuals living in an environment with fluctuating salinity. The research found that the optimal fraction of generalist chloride cells is influenced by the frequency of salinity changes, the time needed for new cell functionality, and the maintenance cost.
JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Biology
Rena Hayashi, Shingo Iwami, Yoh Iwasa
Summary: After infecting a host, a viral strain may rapidly increase and produce mutants with a faster proliferation rate than the original virus. However, most mutants become extinct due to the stochasticity caused by a small number of infected cells. The study calculated the fraction of mutants that could escape stochastic extinction based on a continuous-time branching process with a time-dependent growth rate.
JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Biology
Yoh Iwasa, Yoichi Yusa, Sachi Yamaguchi
Summary: This paper develops an evolutionary game to examine the conditions for different life-cycle types to succeed in a seasonal environment. The study finds that planktotrophy is favored when the planktonic stages are more efficient in terms of biomass gain, while lecithotrophy or direct development is more advantageous under specific conditions.
JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY
(2022)
Article
Biology
Yoh Iwasa, Rena Hayashi
Summary: This study presents a simple model that couples social and epidemiological dynamics, revealing the relationship between people's activities and waves of infection. The model shows different oscillation patterns and variations, as well as the control conditions of infection.
JOURNAL OF THEORETICAL BIOLOGY
(2023)
Review
Biology
Yoh Iwasa, Sachi Yamaguchi
Summary: Marine animals exhibit diverse and flexible sexual systems. This review focuses on theoretical studies in the last decade, highlighting advancements in understanding sex change in coral fishes, diverse sexual patterns in barnacles, larval production strategies, and temperature-based sex determination in fish and reptiles. The game model provides a valuable framework to comprehend the diversity of sexual patterns, considering various constraints and incorporating physiological and molecular mechanisms.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY B-BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
(2023)
Article
Ecology
Mayumi Seto, Ben P. P. Harvey, Shigeki Wada, Sylvain Agostini
Summary: The rise in carbon dioxide concentrations is expected to lead to a shift from macroalgae-dominated to turf algae-dominated ecosystems, as higher CO2 levels favor turf algae proliferation and inhibit the recruitment of macroalgae. This study found that discontinuous regime shifts occur when turf algae coverage reaches a critical level that impedes macroalgal recruitment. The results also suggest that both the inhibitory effect of turf algae and the self-enhancing effect of macroalgae play a role in predicting potential regime shifts in response to future CO2 changes.
THEORETICAL ECOLOGY
(2023)
Review
Cell Biology
Yoh Iwasa
Summary: We reviewed mathematical models and concepts in developmental biology, including the feedback vertex set in ascidian embryos, tissue deformation in chick limb bud formation, mechanobiology and its impact on cell shape and gene expression, and the adaptive design of development in response to fluctuating environments.
DEVELOPMENT GROWTH & DIFFERENTIATION
(2023)
Article
Genetics & Heredity
Yoh Iwasa, Sou Tomimoto, Akiko Satake
Summary: Genomic sequencing reveals that somatic mutations cause genetic differentiation of cells within a single tree. A mathematical model for stem cell proliferation in the shoot apical meristem (SAM) was studied. Phylogenetic distance between cells sampled from different parts of a shoot was evaluated, indicating genetic differences due to mutations accumulated during shoot elongation. The tissue's cell walls suppress cell location exchange, resulting in genetic differentiation according to shoot angle and increased genetic variance among cells.
Article
Biology
Rena Hayashi, Yoh Iwasa
Summary: A high mutation rate of the RNA virus can result in the emergence of novel mutants that may evade the immunity of the original strain. However, many of these mutants go extinct due to the stochasticity of initial infected cell numbers. This study examines the impact of escaping host immune reactions and concludes that the chance of a mutant strain being established decreases with time since the wild-type infection.
BULLETIN OF MATHEMATICAL BIOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Ecology
Mayumi Seto, Michio Kondoh
Summary: Microbial life in low-energy ecosystems relies on individual energy conservation and optimizing energy use in response to competition and mutualistic interactions. A new community-level strategy for increasing energy use efficiency is proposed, which involves microbial functional diversity and metabolic handoffs. The mutualistic division of labour and complexity of redox pathways promote material cycling and energy exploitation. These findings have important implications for microbial ecosystem functioning and the co-evolution of life and Earth.
