Sensory input attenuation allows predictive sexual response in yeast
Animals are known to adjust their sexual behaviour depending on mate competition. Here we report similar regulation for mating behaviour in a sexual unicellular eukaryote, the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. We demonstrate that pheromone-based communication between the two mating types, coup...
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| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article (Journal) |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
25 Aug 2016
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| In: |
Nature Communications
Year: 2016, Volume: 7 |
| ISSN: | 2041-1723 |
| DOI: | 10.1038/ncomms12590 |
| Online Access: | Verlag, lizenzpflichtig, Volltext: https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms12590 Verlag, lizenzpflichtig, Volltext: https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms12590 
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| Author Notes: | Alvaro Banderas, Mihaly Koltai, Alexander Anders & Victor Sourjik |
| Summary: | Animals are known to adjust their sexual behaviour depending on mate competition. Here we report similar regulation for mating behaviour in a sexual unicellular eukaryote, the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. We demonstrate that pheromone-based communication between the two mating types, coupled to input attenuation by recipient cells, enables yeast to robustly monitor relative mate abundance (sex ratio) within a mixed population and to adjust their commitment to sexual reproduction in proportion to their estimated chances of successful mating. The mechanism of sex-ratio sensing relies on the diffusible peptidase Bar1, which is known to degrade the pheromone signal produced by mating partners. We further show that such a response to sexual competition within a population can optimize the fitness trade-off between the costs and benefits of mating response induction. Our study thus provides an adaptive explanation for the known molecular mechanism of pheromone degradation in yeast. |
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| Item Description: | Gesehen am 19.08.2020 |
| Physical Description: | Online Resource |
| ISSN: | 2041-1723 |
| DOI: | 10.1038/ncomms12590 |