Reflections on the history of microbial chemical ecology

Abstract

Researchers in chemical ecology typically focus on macroorganisms, ignoring molecules that mediate microbial interactions. Several breakthroughs in microbial chemical ecology led to the view that bacteria communicate via signaling molecules. This phenomenon was named quorum sensing in 1994. Some researchers now question whether quorum sensing is the right term to describe bacterial communication noting, for example, that individual cells of some bacteria communicate over long distances.