Microbial population biology is the application of the principles of

population biology The term population biology has been used with different meanings. In 1971 Edward O. Wilson ''et al''. used the term in the sense of applying mathematical models to population genetics, community ecology, and population dynamics. Alan Hastings u ...

microorganisms A microorganism, or microbe,, ''mikros'', "small") and ''organism'' from the el, ὀργανισμός, ''organismós'', "organism"). It is usually written as a single word but is sometimes hyphenated (''micro-organism''), especially in olde ...

Distinguishing from other biological disciplines

Microbial population biology, in practice, is the application of

population ecology Population ecology is a sub-field of ecology that deals with the dynamics of species populations and how these populations interact with the environment, such as birth and death rates, and by immigration and emigration. The discipline is import ...

and

population genetics Population genetics is a subfield of genetics that deals with genetic differences within and between populations, and is a part of evolutionary biology. Studies in this branch of biology examine such phenomena as adaptation, speciation, and po ...

toward understanding the

ecology Ecology () is the study of the relationships between living organisms, including humans, and their physical environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere level. Ecology overl ...

and

evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...

bacteria Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one biological cell. They constitute a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria were am ...

archaebacteria Archaea ( ; singular archaeon ) is a domain of single-celled organisms. These microorganisms lack cell nuclei and are therefore prokaryotes. Archaea were initially classified as bacteria, receiving the name archaebacteria (in the Archaebact ...

microscopic The microscopic scale () is the scale of objects and events smaller than those that can easily be seen by the naked eye, requiring a lens or microscope to see them clearly. In physics, the microscopic scale is sometimes regarded as the scale be ...

fungi A fungus ( : fungi or funguses) is any member of the group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds, as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as a kingdom, separately fr ...

(such as

yeasts Yeasts are eukaryotic, single-celled microorganisms classified as members of the fungus kingdom. The first yeast originated hundreds of millions of years ago, and at least 1,500 species are currently recognized. They are estimated to constitut ...

), additional microscopic

eukaryotes Eukaryotes () are organisms whose cells have a nucleus. All animals, plants, fungi, and many unicellular organisms, are Eukaryotes. They belong to the group of organisms Eukaryota or Eukarya, which is one of the three domains of life. Bacter ...

(e.g., "

protozoa Protozoa (singular: protozoan or protozoon; alternative plural: protozoans) are a group of single-celled eukaryotes, either free-living or parasitic, that feed on organic matter such as other microorganisms or organic tissues and debris. Histo ...

" and

algae Algae (; singular alga ) is an informal term for a large and diverse group of photosynthetic eukaryotic organisms. It is a polyphyletic grouping that includes species from multiple distinct clades. Included organisms range from unicellular micr ...

), and

viruses A virus is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses infect all life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea. Since Dmitri Ivanovsky's ...

. Microbial population biology also encompasses the evolution and ecology of community interactions (

community ecology In ecology, a community is a group or association of populations of two or more different species occupying the same geographical area at the same time, also known as a biocoenosis, biotic community, biological community, ecological community, ...

) between microorganisms, including microbial

coevolution In biology, coevolution occurs when two or more species reciprocally affect each other's evolution through the process of natural selection. The term sometimes is used for two traits in the same species affecting each other's evolution, as well ...

and

predator-prey interaction Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill the ...

s. In addition, microbial population biology considers microbial interactions with more macroscopic

organism In biology, an organism () is any living system that functions as an individual entity. All organisms are composed of cells ( cell theory). Organisms are classified by taxonomy into groups such as multicellular animals, plants, and fu ...

s (e.g., host-

parasite Parasitism is a close relationship between species, where one organism, the parasite, lives on or inside another organism, the host, causing it some harm, and is adapted structurally to this way of life. The entomologist E. O. Wilson h ...

interactions), though strictly this should be more from the perspective of the microscopic rather than the macroscopic organism. A good deal of microbial population biology may be described also as microbial

evolutionary ecology Evolutionary ecology lies at the intersection of ecology and evolutionary biology. It approaches the study of ecology in a way that explicitly considers the evolutionary histories of species and the interactions between them. Conversely, it can ...

. On the other hand, typically microbial population biologists (unlike microbial ecologists) are less concerned with questions of the role of microorganisms in

ecosystem ecology Ecosystem ecology is the integrated study of living ( biotic) and non-living (abiotic) components of ecosystems and their interactions within an ecosystem framework. This science examines how ecosystems work and relates this to their components ...

, which is the study of

nutrient cycling A nutrient cycle (or ecological recycling) is the movement and exchange of inorganic and organic matter back into the production of matter. Energy flow is a unidirectional and noncyclic pathway, whereas the movement of mineral nutrients is cycli ...

and energy movement between biotic as well as abiotic components of ecosystems. Microbial population biology can include aspects of

molecular evolution Molecular evolution is the process of change in the sequence composition of cellular molecules such as DNA, RNA, and proteins across generations. The field of molecular evolution uses principles of evolutionary biology and population genet ...

phylogenetics In biology, phylogenetics (; from Greek φυλή/ φῦλον [] "tribe, clan, race", and wikt:γενετικός, γενετικός [] "origin, source, birth") is the study of the evolutionary history and relationships among or within groups ...

. Strictly, however, these emphases should be employed toward understanding issues of microbial evolution and ecology rather than as a means of understanding more universal truths applicable to both microscopic and macroscopic organisms. The microorganisms in such endeavors consequently should be recognized as organisms rather than simply as molecular or evolutionary

reductionist Reductionism is any of several related philosophical ideas regarding the associations between phenomena which can be described in terms of other simpler or more fundamental phenomena. It is also described as an intellectual and philosophical p ...

model systems. Thus, the study of RNA ''

in vitro ''In vitro'' (meaning in glass, or ''in the glass'') studies are performed with microorganisms, cells, or biological molecules outside their normal biological context. Colloquially called " test-tube experiments", these studies in biology a ...

'' evolution is not microbial population biology and nor is the ''

in silico In biology and other experimental sciences, an ''in silico'' experiment is one performed on computer or via computer simulation. The phrase is pseudo-Latin for 'in silicon' (correct la, in silicio), referring to silicon in computer chips. It ...

'' generation of phylogenies of otherwise non-microbial sequences, even if aspects of either may in some (especially unintentional) manner be analogous to evolution in actual microbial populations. Microbial population biology can (and often does) involve the testing of more-general ecological and evolutionary hypotheses. Again, it is important to retain some emphasis on the microbe since at some point this "question-driven" microbial population biology becomes instead population biology using microorganisms. Because the point of departure of these potentially disparate emphases can be somewhat arbitrary, there exist vague and not universally accepted delimits around what the discipline of microbial population biology does and does not constitute.

Microbial Population Biology Gordon conference

A Microbial Population Biology

Gordon Research Conference Gordon Research Conferences are a group of international scientific conferences organized by a non-profit organization of the same name. The conference topics cover frontier research in the biological, chemical, and physical sciences, and th ...

is held every odd year, to date in New England (and usually in New Hampshire). The 200
conference web page
introduces the meetings as:

Microbial Population Biology covers a diverse range of cutting edge issues in the microbial sciences and beyond. Firmly founded in evolutionary biology and with a strongly integrative approach, past meetings have covered topics ranging from the dynamics and genetics of adaptation to the evolution of mutation rate, community ecology, evolutionary genomics, altruism, and epidemiology.

This meeting is never dull: some of the most significant and contentious issues in biology have been thrashed out here.

A history of the meeting can be foun
here
The next Microbial Population Biology Gordon conference is scheduled for 2011. Information on past (and future) meetings is summarized as follows: {, border = "1" cellpadding = "4" align = "center" , +Past and Future GRC Microbial Population Biology Meetings !align="left" width="25" , year !align="left" width="130" , chair !align="left" width="130" , vice chair(s) !align="left" , additional information , - !2017 !Eva Top & Larry Forney !Ben Kerr
GRC page
, - !2015 ! Michael Travisano !Eva Top & Larry Forney
GRC page
, - !2013 !Paul E. Turner !Michael Travisano
GRC page
, - !align="left" , 2011 , valign="top",

James J. Bull James Jeffrey Bull is Johann Friedrich Miescher Regents Professor in Molecular Biology at the University of Texas at Austin. He is best known for his influential 1983 monograph, ''Evolution of Sex Determining Mechanisms''. In the early 1990s, h ...

, , valign="top", Paul E. Turner ,
GRC page, current meeting page
, - !align="left" , 2009 , valign="top", Anthony M. Dean , , valign="top",

,
GRC page, current meeting page
, - !align="left" , 2007 , valign="top", Paul B. Rainey , , valign="top", Anthony M. Dean ,

, - !align="left" , 2005 , valign="top", Margaret A. Riley , , valign="top", Paul B. Rainey ,
GRC page, past meetings page
, - !align="left" , 2003 , valign="top", Siv G. E. Andersson , , valign="top", Margaret A. Riley ,
GRC page, past meetings page
, - !align="left" , 2001 , valign="top",

Lin Chao Lin Chao is a Chinese Brazilian American evolutionary biologist and geneticist. Chao gained his PhD in 1977 from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, as a student of Bruce R. Levin (now at Emory University), and was a NIH postdoctoral fellow ...

, , valign="top", Siv G. E. Andersson ,
GRC page, past meetings page
, - !align="left" , 1999 , valign="top", Howard Ochman , , valign="top", Richard Moxon ,
GRC page, past meetings page
, - !align="left" , 1997 , valign="top", Julian P. Adams , , Susan M. Rosenberg ,
GRC page, past meetings page
, - !align="left" , 1995 , valign="top", Daniel E. Dykhuizen , , Richard E. Lenski ,
GRC page, past meetings page
, - !align="left" , 1993 , valign="top", John Roth , , Rosemary J. Redfield ,
GRC page, conference portfolio
, - !align="left" , 1991 , valign="top",

Allan M. Campbell Allan McCulloch Campbell (April 27, 1929 – April 19, 2018) was an American microbiologist and geneticist and the Barbara Kimball Browning Professor Emeritus in the Department of Biology at Stanford University. His pioneering work on Lambda p ...

, , Daniel E. Dykhuizen ,
GRC page, conference portfolio
, - !align="left" , 1989 , valign="top", Monica Riley , , Conrad A. Istock ,
GRC page, conference portfolio
, - !align="left" , 1987 , valign="top", Barry G. Hall , , Daniel E. Dykhuizen ,
GRC page, conference portfolio
, - !align="left" valign="top", 1985 , valign="top", Bruce R. Levin , , Daniel L. Hartl
Barry G. Hall , , valign="top"
GRC page, conference portfolio
, -

External links

Microbial Population Biology
* Phage meetings *

Human microbiome project The Human Microbiome Project (HMP) was a United States National Institutes of Health (NIH) research initiative to improve understanding of the microbiota involved in human health and disease. Launched in 2007, the first phase (HMP1) focused on ...

Environmental microbiology Population ecology Evolutionary biology

Distinguishing from other biological disciplines

Microbial Population Biology Gordon conference

See also

External links