Kin Structure, Kin Recognition, and Cooperation in a Model System

亲属关系是许多合作的关键因素。为了让个人与他们的亲属合作，他们必须以某种方式识别他们的亲属。这可以通过环境结构或主动识别过程来实现。识别和合作可以使许多生物受益。其中一些生物包括微生物，其中的合作实际上会伤害动物宿主，因此了解微生物的亲属识别和合作对人类福利具有重要意义。研究人员将研究一种群居变形虫的亲缘结构和识别能力，这种变形虫在独居阶段吃细菌，在群居阶段聚集成一个多细胞集体，移动并产生孢子。他们发现这种变形虫可以区分有亲缘关系和没有亲缘关系的个体，这些变形虫利用这种能力来避开没有亲缘关系的变形虫，并保护某些种类的细菌。研究人员将测试在该系统中识别亲属的不同机制。他们将记录变形虫捕食细菌时的生长模式。他们将研究识别基因，并考虑分散距离在识别中的作用。此外，研究人员将探索这些变形虫利用细菌毒性的机制。总的来说，这项研究有很大的潜力来促进我们对微生物之间相互作用的理解；这反过来又有助于我们理解微生物是如何直接影响人类和我们生活的环境的。该项目将有助于本科生和研究生的科学培训，并将通过网站、维基百科条目和面向K-12学生的活动向公众宣传。

Kinship is a crucial element in many kinds of cooperation. In order for individuals to cooperate with their kin they must identify their relatives somehow. This can happen through the structure of the environment, or through active recognition processes. Recognition and cooperation can benefit many kinds of organisms. Some of these organisms include microbes where cooperation can actually harm the animal hosts, so understanding kin recognition and cooperation in microbes can have important implications for human welfare.The investigators will study kin structure and recognition in a social amoeba that has a solitary stage where it eats bacteria and a social stage where it aggregates into a multi-cellular collective that moves and produces spores. They have found that this amoeba can distinguish between related and unrelated individuals and these amoebae use this ability to avoid unrelated amoebae and to protect certain kinds of bacteria. The investigators will test different mechanisms for recognizing relatives in this system. They will document the growth patterns of the amoebae as they prey upon bacteria. They will examine genes for recognition and they will consider the role of dispersal distance in recognition. Furthermore the investigators will explore the mechanisms through which these amoebae exploit the toxicity of bacteria. Taken together, this research has great potential to promote our understanding of the interactions between microbes; which in turn will contribute to our understanding of how microbes directly affect humans and the environment in which we live. The project will contribute to the scientific training of undergraduate and graduate students and will reach out to the public via websites, Wikipedia entries, and events for K-12 students.