Analyses of microbial interspecies interactions mediated by flagella

种间相互作用和由此产生的新兴功能是微生物群落在各种生态系统中发挥作用的关键，如全球元素循环，发酵生产和水处理。然而，在基于纯培养研究发展起来的现代微生物学中，对种间相互作用的了解是有限的。本研究旨在加深我们对产甲烷互养财团中物种间相互作用、信号转导和群落功能的理解，特别关注最近发现的鞭毛介导的相互作用。我们还研究了鞭毛在天然产甲烷菌群落建立中的作用。我们发现，鞭毛介导的共生是重要的，不仅建立人工组装的产甲烷财团，但也自然发生的生物膜社区。

Interspecies interactions and resultant emergent functions are essential for microbial communities to play their roles in a variety of ecosystems, such as global element cycles, fermentative production, and water treatment. In modern microbiology that has developed based on pure-culture studies, however, knowledge on interspecies interactions is limited. This study was conducted to deepen our understanding of interspecies interactions, signal transduction, and emergence of community functions in methanogenic syntrophic consortia with particular focus on recently discovered flagellum-mediated interactions. We also investigated roles of flagella on the establishment of naturally occurring methanogenic communities. We found that flagellum-mediated symbiosis is important for establishing not only artificially assembled methanogenic consortia but also naturally occurring biofilm communities.