TraitMech

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aerotropism

traitmech:000601 · CLASS · PROPOSED

A phenotype in which polarized growth is directionally biased in response to a spatial oxygen concentration gradient.

Trait evidence (2)

  • DOI:10.1016/S0168-6496(03)00161-2
    Conidia also germinated close to air-filled Teflon tubes and exhibited germ-tube tropism, but not as distinctly as on living reed roots.

    Abstract, exact-matched at Europe PMC (PMID:19719598). Publisher HTML methods, results and discussion were read at https://academic.oup.com/femsec/article/45/3/293/549782. Section 3.2 reports Microdochium bolleyi germ-tube orientation toward air-filled Teflon root dummies (60% +/- 12%) and stronger orientation toward living roots. This is qualified supporting evidence: oxygen-dependent germination and root-derived chemicals complicate attribution, and the tube result alone does not establish significance against random orientation. Figure 3 measures germination, not orientation. Figures were not visually verified. No strain accession or molecular mechanism is asserted.

  • DOI:10.1155/2012/517529
    C. albicans responds to other external stimuli in vitro, displaying aerotropism under hypoxic conditions and galvanotropism, where hyphae germinate and orient towards the cathode in an applied electric field (Figure 2(c)(iii)) [94, 97, 98].

    Brand (2012), Hyphal Growth in Human Fungal Pathogens and Its Role in Virulence; published online in 2011, volume 2012. Review, not independent experimental replication. Full text directly retrieved as Europe PMC JATS XML (PMC3216317), https://www.ebi.ac.uk/europepmc/webservices/rest/PMC3216317/fullTextXML. The complete sentence exact-matches the XML text and is quoted under its Creative Commons Attribution license. It supports use of aerotropism for hyphal responses under hypoxia, not a quantified oxygen-gradient experiment or a mechanism. The cathode and Figure 2(c)(iii) clauses describe galvanotropism, not aerotropism; no figure-based oxygen claim is made. Its cited Aoki paper remains an unverified primary-source lead in the discussion.

Provenance

Identifier source
TraitMech local identifier
Definition source
DOI:10.1016/S0168-6496(03)00161-2

Parent traits (1)

kg-microbe context

No kg-microbe node embedding matched this record in the 2026-04-25 deepwalk.

Discussions and Knowledge Gaps (2)

Open questions attached to this trait. Seeded by just knowledge-gap-scan and curated; see the corpus-wide index.

Keep oxygen-directed growth distinct from oxygen demand, taxis and flow.

CURATION TODO OPEN aerotropism-direction-and-stimulus-boundaries · raised by codex · 2026-10-04

Not yet attached to a section of this record — a curator sets attaches_to (e.g. causal_graphs#some_edge) so the gap shows beside the mechanism it concerns.

The class includes positive or negative directional growth, without requiring both in one organism. This is a polarity-neutral scope decision, not verification of a negative response: the avoidance lead below is unread. Aerotaxis denotes locomotion, not growth orientation. Oxygen tolerance, oxygen requirement, biomass, germination and extension rate alone are insufficient. This record uses the oxygen-gradient sense of aerotropism; air-flow-directed growth belongs to rheotropism, not this class solely because air supplies oxygen. Resolve external phenotype mappings and variant-label scopes before adding xrefs or synonyms. The local parent is chemotropism (traitmech:000597); its v474 METPO:1055100 proposal is not released. The v478 proposal therefore uses the existing METPO:1000059 phenotype parent; reconcile the narrower hierarchy when chemotropism is accepted.

Resolve gradient controls, strain provenance and native causal mechanisms.

CURATION TODO OPEN aerotropism-controls-and-native-mechanism · raised by codex · 2026-10-04

Not yet attached to a section of this record — a curator sets attaches_to (e.g. causal_graphs#some_edge) so the gap shows beside the mechanism it concerns.

Unverified research leads: Aoki et al. (1998), DOI:10.1007/BF02464003, and Carlile and Tew (1988), DOI:10.1016/S0007-1536(88)80071-8. Crossref and Elsevier API retrievals confirmed metadata only; publisher retrieval returned 403. Search-index-limited summaries suggest positive Candida hyphal reorientation and negative aerotropism in Phytophthora germ tubes, respectively. Original wording, full text, figures and controls remain unverified. These are research leads, not definition authority or counted trait evidence (#1680, #1681). Inspect the older full texts and orientation readouts, and discriminate tip reorientation from preferential growth or survival in oxygen-rich regions. Resolve natural strain provenance and NCBI identity before canonical examples. The current evidence does not establish a universal oxygen sensor or a taxon-independent protein mechanism. Do not transfer pheromone chemotropism or aerotaxis mechanisms without direct evidence. Defer causal graphs until native causal evidence and taxon-paired protein accessions support them; NONMECHANISTIC is not a grounding bypass.

Curation history

  1. · MINTED_TRAITMECH_ID · codex

    Added polarity-neutral oxygen-gradient-directed growth under local chemotropism, supported by three primary DOI citations and source snippets. Ignored-and-hidden novelty searches and structured OWL review found no exact term. Reserved METPO:1055500 in v478 under the released phenotype parent. Recorded indexed abstract access limits, growth confounds and pending narrower METPO hierarchy; deferred canonical strains and causal graphs.

  2. · EVIDENCE_CORRECTION · codex

    Addressed #1676: replaced the margin-reorientation abstract quote with a contiguous oxygen-gradient passage so the definition snippet identifies the stimulus. Retained reorientation evidence, source-access limits and growth confounds in notes.

  3. · REVIEW_CORRECTION · codex

    Addressed #1678 and #1679: removed the two snippets obtained only from indexed publisher text. Prior history describes those now-withdrawn quotes, not directly verified source wording. Retained qualified DOI-backed interpretations in notes and the directly verified Damm snippet. Changed the definition genus to phenotype to match the released proposal parent, preserving the local chemotropism parent and pending hierarchy explanation.

  4. · REVIEW_CORRECTION · codex

    Addressed #1680 and #1681: moved unread Aoki and Carlile papers from counted evidence to qualified discussion leads. Replaced Aoki as definition authority with directly read Damm. Added directly retrieved Brand review with an exact full-sentence quote under its Attribution license; labeled its terminology role, not independent experimental replication. Negative direction remains unverified. Withdraws the prior histories' evidence-authority claims for the two unread papers; earlier events remain unchanged. No new snippet-baseline exceptions.