tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8441491750914005356.post8501178276811486031..comments2023-06-16T12:27:49.821+01:00Comments on Microbes Rule the Waves - 2013: Besides chitin, mannitol helps Vibrio cholerae to survive in the marine environment by activating its biofilm formation!Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8441491750914005356.post-50351242682961274922014-03-28T11:50:23.176+00:002014-03-28T11:50:23.176+00:00Hi Marie
thanks for the comment.
This paper showed...Hi Marie<br />thanks for the comment.<br />This paper showed that mannitol acts as a signal to activate biofilm formation in V. cholerae. Thus, the focus was on mannitol-induced cellular pathways and its consequences. They did not investigate anything chitin-related and I did not find if mannitol-induced biofilm formation occurs/does not occur under high mannitol and low chitin conditions in their discussion. <br />As per Ellie's post (published on 16th December 2013 on blog based on Nahar et al. 2012) chitin directly acts as food source to activate the toxicogenic stage of V. cholerae and it helps V. cholerae to persist in the plankton reservoir in esturine waters. This paper clearly demonstrated that mannitol concentration of as low as 400 micromolar is enough to activate biofilm formation in V. cholerae. Specific microhabitats like algal mats of brown algae releases high concentrations (~700 micromolar) of mannitol during photosynthesis which would be more than enough to acitvate biofilm formation in V. cholerae. Nevertheless, I think there would be other factors as well that would influence biofilm formation and/or planktonic state of V. cholerae.<br />Thus, it doesn't look like this would occur only under high mannitol conditions. Apart from that its relation to low/high concentration of chitin is totally unknown. I tried to find recent papers with the keywords "Vibrio cholerae, mannitol chitin" in both google scholar and web of science but did not get any papers that have linked all three. <br />If you find such paper that relates these three, then please let me know.<br /><br />I believe it is not just mannitol that would induce biofilm formation. similarly it is not just chitin that would feed these bacteria in the marine environment. Many other organic compounds would be out there that V. cholerae would be using. <br />Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13018962431501042650noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8441491750914005356.post-47964820152198556872014-03-26T16:30:14.064+00:002014-03-26T16:30:14.064+00:00Do you think that this is only favoured under high...Do you think that this is only favoured under high-mannitol low-chitin conditions?Perhaps the presence of chitin, would out-favour mannitol? Has this been tested? The two different lifestyles (planktonic and within a biofilm) you've mentioned in your blog might be attributed to the balance between chitin and mannitol within the environment, in and amongst other environmental variables. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01000763996487715534noreply@blogger.com