FIG 2.

Effect of antibiotics upon microbial community interactions. In nature, antibiotics can have significant impacts upon interactions between species and strains of microbes. Rather than acting solely as a microbial weapon of warfare, we know that antibiotics can also function as signaling molecules and transcriptional modifiers. Antibiotic compounds can also create opportunities for community mutualisms with strains both resistant and sensitive, depending upon the context of the interaction. This suggests that antibiotics can play important and complex roles in community assembly and diversity and further implies the importance of paired production and resistance genes in microbial ecology.