Articles of Significant Interest Selected from This Issue by the Editors

摘要

Siderophores are iron-binding molecules secreted by microbes under low-iron conditions. Bacteria are frequently equipped with mechanisms to pirate siderophores (where they take up siderophores they do not produce to acquire iron from the environment). Work by Grandchamp et al. (e03293-16) demonstrated that pirated siderophores can also accelerate bacterial differentiation. They showed that enterobactin, a siderophore produced by Escherichia coli (along with other exogenous siderophores), promotes sporulation in Bacillus subtilis. This finding suggests that, in addition to having a role in iron acquisition, siderophores can act as interspecies differentiation cues, altering sporulation within microbial communities.