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Cited by 87Bacterial Genetics and BiotechnologyRNA and protein synthesis mechanismsMicrobial Community Ecology and Physiology

Evolutionary tradeoffs in cellular composition across diverse bacteria

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Kempes, Christopher P, Wang, Lawrence, Amend, Jan P, Doyle, John, Hoehler, Tori·2016·The ISME Journal
DOI 10.1038/ismej.2016.21PMC PMC4989312
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Abstract

One of the most important classic and contemporary interests in biology is the connection between cellular composition and physiological function. Decades of research have allowed us to understand the detailed relationship between various cellular components and processes for individual species, and have uncovered common functionality across diverse species. However, there still remains the need for frameworks that can mechanistically predict the tradeoffs between cellular functions and elucidate and interpret average trends across species. Here we provide a comprehensive analysis of how cellular composition changes across the diversity of bacteria as connected with physiological function and metabolism, spanning five orders of magnitude in body size. We present an analysis of the trends with cell volume that covers shifts in genomic, protein, cellular envelope, RNA and ribosomal content. We show that trends in protein content are more complex than a simple proportionality with the overall genome size, and that the number of ribosomes is simply explained by cross-species shifts in biosynthesis requirements. Furthermore, we show that the largest and smallest bacteria are limited by physical space requirements. At the lower end of size, cell volume is dominated by DNA and protein content-the requirement for which predicts a lower limit on cell size that is in good agreement with the smallest observed bacteria. At the upper end of bacterial size, we have identified a point at which the number of ribosomes required for biosynthesis exceeds available cell volume. Between these limits we are able to discuss systematic and dramatic shifts in cellular composition. Much of our analysis is connected with the basic energetics of cells where we show that the scaling of metabolic rate is surprisingly superlinear with all cellular components.

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  • Because of the nature of these transitions, they are likely to be relevant in our understanding of macroevolutionary processes, ranging from punctuated equilibrium to the hierarchical nature of evolutionary change and the role that constraints play in setting transition points.

    “Because of the nature of these transitions, they are likely to be relevant in our understanding of macroevolutionary processes, ranging from punctuated equilibrium [318] to the hierarchical nature of evolutionary change [346,347] and the role that constraints play in setting transition points [105,348,349].”

    From Fundamental constraints to the logic of living systems (2024) · cites this paper as [349]

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Authors
Kempes, C. P., Wang, L., Amend, J. P., Doyle, J., & Hoehler, T.
Affiliations
  • California Institute of Technology (US)
  • University of Southern California (US)
  • Ames Research Center (US)
Corresponding author
Kempes, Christopher P
ORCID
Venue
The ISME Journal
Publisher
Oxford University Press (OUP)
Published
2016-04-05
Volume
10
Issue
9
Pages
2145-2157
ISSN
  • 1751-7362 (ISSN-L)
  • 1751-7370
DOI
10.1038/ismej.2016.21
PMC
PMC4989312
OpenAlex
W2316937080
Cited by
87
References
4
Citations by year
2026: 9 · 2025: 10 · 2024: 9 · 2023: 12 · 2022: 13 · 2021: 13 · 2020: 6 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 4 · 2017: 4 · 2016: 3
FWCI
4.04
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • The ISME Journal (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • CaltechAUTHORS (California Institute of Technology) (submittedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
Funders
  • National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NNA13AA92A)
  • Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation
  • NASA Astrobiology Institute (NNA13AA92A)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Bacterial Genetics and Biotechnology
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › RNA and protein synthesis mechanisms
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Microbial Community Ecology and Physiology
Keywords
bacterial cell size, cell composition, protein content, ribosome number, cell volume, genome size, cell envelope, RNA content, bacterial metabolism, cellular energetics
MeSH terms
Bacteria, Biological Evolution, Ribosomes, RNA, Bacterial, Genome, Bacterial, Genomics

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