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Quorum Sensing

  • Reference work entry
The Prokaryotes

Abstract

Bacteria have an exquisite ability to sense and adapt to a constantly fluctuating environment. They have evolved the capacity to detect a variety of temporal and spatial cues, and in response to such stimuli, bacteria initiate signal transduction cascades that culminate in changes in gene expression. The ability to rapidly alter gene expression, and consequently behavior, in response to a dynamic environment presumably gives bacteria the plasticity to survive in rich, neutral, and hostile situations.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Molecular Biology, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA

    Bonnie L. Bassler

  2. Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA

    Melissa B. Miller

Authors
  1. Bonnie L. Bassler
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  2. Melissa B. Miller
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Molecular Microbiology and Biotechnology, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel

    Eugene Rosenberg

  2. Department of Biological Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Edward F. DeLong

  3. Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Stephen Lory

  4. Leibniz Institute DSMZ-German Collection of Microorganisms and Cell Cultures, Braunschweig, Germany

    Erko Stackebrandt

  5. Laboratory of Microbiology, Institute of Biology, Center for Health Sciences, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), Ilha do Fundão, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

    Fabiano Thompson

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© 2013 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Bassler, B.L., Miller, M.B. (2013). Quorum Sensing. In: Rosenberg, E., DeLong, E.F., Lory, S., Stackebrandt, E., Thompson, F. (eds) The Prokaryotes. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-30123-0_60

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