Konstantinidis2021 - Persistence of mutants in a mutualistic microbial co-culture

This agent-based model is based on an adaptive laboratory evolution (ALE) experiment scenario of two mutually cross feeding strains of bacteria and yeast. The bacterial strain secretes vitamins for which the yeast strain is auxotrophic and the yeast strain secrets amino acids for which the bacterial strain is auxotrophic. In particular, the model simulates a situation where a mutation arises in the bacterial strain that results in the emergence of individuals (mutant bacteria) with a higher secretion of vitamins as compared to the wild type (WT). This increase in secretion comes with a cost in terms of fitness (growth rate) of the mutant bacteria. The model can be used to assess if this mutant is able to persist and increase in frequency in the cross-feeding community.