Results

Do A. elegantissima and S. muscatinei synchronize their growth rates?

Figure 1. DNA staining and cell cycle analysis were used to determine the relative percentage (mean ± SE; n = 11) of A. elegantissima and S. muscatinei cells in the G1, S and G2/M cell cycle phases. A paired t-test was used to determine cell cycle synchrony in the host and symbiont in the three cell cycle phases.

To determine if synchronized growth in host and symbiont cells occurs, the percentage of cells in each cell division phase was compared. The percentage of A. elegantissima and S. muscatinei cells in the G1, S and G2/M was within 5% of each other (Figure 1). Significant differences between A. elegantissima and S. muscatinei were found only in the S phase data. The proportion of S. muscatinei cells in S phase exceeded that of A. elegantissima cells by approximately 4%.