TraitMech

TraitMech › PHYSIOLOGY

chemokinesis

traitmech:000586 · CLASS · PROPOSED

A motile phenotype in which swimming speed changes in response to chemical concentration, without requiring directional bias along a chemical gradient.

Trait evidence (4)

  • DOI:10.1038/ismej.2013.210
    chemokinesis is the ability to change swimming speed in response to a change in chemical concentration.

    Discussion, page 1005, visually checked in the author-hosted published PDF at https://stockerlab.ethz.ch/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/49.-Garren_etal_ISME_2014.pdf. This bacterial usage defines chemokinesis by speed, in contrast to chemotactic directional bias. The two responses can coexist. This citation supports identity; no independent reanalysis of its supplementary assays is claimed.

  • DOI:10.1073/pnas.1602307113
    Chemokinesis was also observed in the absence of a chemical gradient

    SI Text, Chemokinesis, page 3 of 9; full article and SI inspected at https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4978249/. Figure S5 and its caption were visually checked in the author PDF at https://stockerlab.ethz.ch/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/89._Son_atall.pdf (SI page 7 of 9). The uniform-serine assay supports a speed response without a gradient. Model block removals are in silico mutants, not biological gene deletions. YM4 cells were harvested in late exponential phase and resuspended in TMN motility medium, pH 7.5; Figure S5 uses uniform 5 micromolar serine at 600 mM sodium. YM4 is a laboratory mutant deficient in lateral flagella, as documented separately by DOI:10.7717/peerj.17126; it is retained as qualified experimental evidence, not a natural canonical example.

  • DOI:10.1038/s41396-021-01024-7
    Thus, we hypothesize that the metabolism of mucus substrate stimulates Na+-NQR activity, which in turn enables sustained chemokinesis.

    Discussion, page 3677, visually checked at https://stockerlab.ethz.ch/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/141.-Cherry-Gao_Coral-Muscus.pdf. The plus is superscript in the typeset sodium notation and plain text in extraction. The following sentence requires experimental testing of this hypothesis. Transcript associations do not establish a causal protein pathway; no supplementary gene-level result is curated here.

  • DOI:10.7717/peerj.17126
    two strains showing defects in the lateral flagellum (VIO5 and YM4)

    Abstract, PMID:38515459. This primary genomic study identifies YM4 as a laboratory strain with defective lateral flagellation. It supplies strain provenance, not a chemokinesis measurement. The Son observation must not be generalized to unperturbed Vibrio alginolyticus. Canonical examples are deferred pending separate verification of a natural exemplar (issue #1653).

Provenance

Identifier source
TraitMech local identifier
Definition source
DOI:10.1038/ismej.2013.210

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.

Preserve the source-defined speed response and its distinction from taxis.

CURATION TODO OPEN chemokinesis-speed-and-taxis-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.

This record follows the swimming-speed usage in Garren, Son and Gao. Chemotaxis (traitmech:000086) concerns directional bias. No equivalence, disjointness or parent-child relation between them is asserted. A speed response can occur with or without chemotaxis and need not always be an increase. Existing research also uses chemokinesis more broadly for changes in turning frequency. Reconcile that broader usage, orthokinesis and klinokinesis before adding synonyms, narrower terms or xrefs; do not equate a turning-only response with this speed definition.

Distinguish observed behavior from model ablations and molecular hypotheses.

CURATION TODO OPEN chemokinesis-mechanism-grounding · 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.

Son's computational removal of functional blocks is not a gene-knockout experiment. Gao's Na+-NQR explanation is explicitly hypothetical, with further experimental work requested. A mechanistic graph is deferred pending source-backed causal edges and eligible taxon-paired protein examples. Do not borrow the enterobacterial Che pathway from chemotaxis, infer causality from transcript changes, or use NONMECHANISTIC to bypass the protein-coverage requirement. No universal receptor is asserted.

Curation history

  1. · MINTED_TRAITMECH_ID · codex

    Added chemokinesis with three primary DOI citations, contiguous snippets and a uniform-serine YM4 example at verified species taxon 663. Ignored-and-hidden searches found only a chemotaxis boundary mention, not an exact record or METPO class. Reserved METPO:1054000 in proposal v463. Kept speed, directional bias, computational ablations and molecular hypotheses separate.

  2. · QUALIFY_EXPERIMENTAL_STRAIN · codex

    Addressed adversarial review #1653: added primary YM4 strain provenance, removed the laboratory-mutant canonical example, and retained its uniform-serine speed response in qualified evidence. Natural canonical exemplars remain deferred.