@article {2204,
	title = {Resource plasticity-driven carbon-nitrogen budgeting enables specialization and division of labor in a clonal community.},
	journal = {Elife},
	volume = {9},
	year = {2020},
	month = {2020 09 02},
	abstract = {<p>Previously, we found that in glucose-limited colonies, metabolic constraints drive cells into groups exhibiting gluconeogenic or glycolytic states. In that study, threshold amounts of trehalose - a limiting, produced carbon-resource, controls the emergence and self-organization of cells exhibiting the glycolytic state, serving as a carbon source that fuels glycolysis (Varahan et al., 2019). We now discover that the plasticity of use of a non-limiting resource, aspartate, controls both resource production and the emergence of heterogeneous cell states, based on differential metabolic budgeting. In gluconeogenic cells, aspartate is a carbon source for trehalose production, while in glycolytic cells using trehalose for carbon, aspartate is predominantly a nitrogen source for nucleotide synthesis. This metabolic plasticity of aspartate enables carbon-nitrogen budgeting, thereby driving the biochemical self-organization of distinct cell states. Through this organization, cells in each state exhibit true division of labor, providing growth/survival advantages for the whole community.</p>
},
	issn = {2050-084X},
	doi = {10.7554/eLife.57609},
	author = {Varahan, Sriram and Sinha, Vaibhhav and Walvekar, Adhish and Krishna, Sandeep and Laxman, Sunil}
}
