Competition: Evidence
Evidence for Competition
1) Organic matter is dispersed through the sand and clay particles in soil. The spaces also contain air and water. Microbes are mostly found associated with organic fractions in the 3 dimensional lattice o soil and we find at least 10 5 microbes per gram of soil.
2) Microbes float freely or attached to fragments of organic matter in the fluid in the stomach of a cow. Here microbes are found at approximately 10 8 cells per ml.
In other words, microbes are commonly packed closely together.
Most of these microbes are heterotrophic. Most of the microbes in these two examples use extracellular digestion, though some that use phagocytosis are also present. Because the cells are so close together, the breakdown products of digestion are available to the neighbouring cells. Yet we think that they are competing for the nutrients.
Question1
