Even a Single Bacterial Cell Can Sense the Seasons Changing
An editorially independent publication supported by the Simons Foundation.
Cyanobacteria can connect the experience of shorter days, like those that encroach in fall, to the onset of winter — and prepare for cold weather.
Every year, in latitudes far enough north or south, a huge swath of life on Earth senses that winter is coming. Leaves fall from trees, sparrows fly to the tropics, raccoons grow thick winter coats, and we unpack our sweaters from storage. Now scientists have shown that this ability to anticipate shorter days and colder temperatures is more fundamental to life than anyone thought: Even short-lived, single-celled organisms can sense day length and get themselves ready for winter.
Lab experiments, recently published in Science, show that cyanobacteria — a type of bacteria that produces energy from sunlight through photosynthesis — anticipate the change by bundling up in their own way. They turn on a set of seasonal genes, including some that adjust the molecular composition of their cell membranes, to improve their odds of survival.
