@article{7387,
  abstract     = {Most bacteria accomplish cell division with the help of a dynamic protein complex called the divisome, which spans the cell envelope in the plane of division. Assembly and activation of this machinery are coordinated by the tubulin-related GTPase FtsZ, which was found to form treadmilling filaments on supported bilayers in vitro1, as well as in live cells, in which filaments circle around the cell division site2,3. Treadmilling of FtsZ is thought to actively move proteins around the division septum, thereby distributing peptidoglycan synthesis and coordinating the inward growth of the septum to form the new poles of the daughter cells4. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying this function are largely unknown. Here, to study how FtsZ polymerization dynamics are coupled to downstream proteins, we reconstituted part of the bacterial cell division machinery using its purified components FtsZ, FtsA and truncated transmembrane proteins essential for cell division. We found that the membrane-bound cytosolic peptides of FtsN and FtsQ co-migrated with treadmilling FtsZ–FtsA filaments, but despite their directed collective behaviour, individual peptides showed random motion and transient confinement. Our work suggests that divisome proteins follow treadmilling FtsZ filaments by a diffusion-and-capture mechanism, which can give rise to a moving zone of signalling activity at the division site.},
  author       = {Baranova, Natalia S. and Radler, Philipp and Hernández-Rocamora, Víctor M. and Alfonso, Carlos and Lopez Pelegrin, Maria D and Rivas, Germán and Vollmer, Waldemar and Loose, Martin},
  issn         = {2058-5276},
  journal      = {Nature Microbiology},
  pages        = {407--417},
  publisher    = {Springer Nature},
  title        = {{Diffusion and capture permits dynamic coupling between treadmilling FtsZ filaments and cell division proteins}},
  doi          = {10.1038/s41564-019-0657-5},
  volume       = {5},
  year         = {2020},
}

@article{6506,
  abstract     = {How does environmental complexity affect the evolution of single genes? Here, we measured the effects of a set of Bacillus subtilis glutamate dehydrogenase mutants across 19 different environments—from phenotypically homogeneous single-cell populations in liquid media to heterogeneous biofilms, plant roots and soil populations. The effects of individual gene mutations on organismal fitness were highly reproducible in liquid cultures. However, 84% of the tested alleles showed opposing fitness effects under different growth conditions (sign environmental pleiotropy). In colony biofilms and soil samples, different alleles dominated in parallel replica experiments. Accordingly, we found that in these heterogeneous cell populations the fate of mutations was dictated by a combination of selection and drift. The latter relates to programmed prophage excisions that occurred during biofilm development. Overall, for each condition, a wide range of glutamate dehydrogenase mutations persisted and sometimes fixated as a result of the combined action of selection, pleiotropy and chance. However, over longer periods and in multiple environments, nearly all of this diversity would be lost—across all the environments and conditions that we tested, the wild type was the fittest allele.},
  author       = {Noda-García, Lianet and Davidi, Dan and Korenblum, Elisa and Elazar, Assaf and Putintseva, Ekaterina and Aharoni, Asaph and Tawfik, Dan S.},
  issn         = {2058-5276},
  journal      = {Nature Microbiology},
  number       = {7},
  pages        = {1221–1230},
  publisher    = {Springer Nature},
  title        = {{Chance and pleiotropy dominate genetic diversity in complex bacterial environments}},
  doi          = {10.1038/s41564-019-0412-y},
  volume       = {4},
  year         = {2019},
}