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dormancy

traitmech:000080 · CLASS · REVIEWED

A reversible physiological state of greatly reduced metabolic activity that allows a cell to survive unfavorable conditions and later resuscitate, generating a microbial seed bank.

Reversible dormancy and resuscitation

Evidence-backed causal sketch linking unfavorable conditions to a reversible dormant state forming a microbial seed bank.

Reversible dormancy and resuscitation Interactive directed graph showing evidence-backed causal relationships for dormancy.

Edge evidence

  • unfavorable conditions causes dormancy process biolink:causes

    Adverse conditions induce entry into dormancy.

    • DOI:10.1038/nrmicro2504 Lennon & Jones review entry/exit from dormancy (seed banks).
  • dormancy process enables dormancy RO:0002327

    The dormancy process realizes the dormancy trait.

    • DOI:10.1038/nrmicro1557 Lewis links dormancy to long-term survival.
  • nutrient limitation or heat stress activates (p)ppGpp stringent response RO:0002213

    Nutrient limitation and heat stress activate the (p)ppGpp stringent response.

    • DOI:10.1186/s12866-024-03628-3 The stringent response mediated by (p)ppGpp is activated by nutrient/heat stresses.
  • (p)ppGpp stringent response causes dormancy process biolink:causes

    (p)ppGpp reprograms cellular activity, resulting in slow growth or dormancy.

    • DOI:10.1186/s12866-024-03628-3 (p)ppGpp can reprogram cellular life activities resulting in slow cell growth or dormancy.
  • (p)ppGpp stringent response upregulates toxin-antitoxin modules

    (p)ppGpp upregulates multiple toxin-antitoxin modules.

    • DOI:10.1186/s12866-024-03628-3 (p)ppGpp upregulates multiple TA modules (hipAB, dinJ/yafQ, mazEF, mqsRA, relBE, yafNO and hokB).
  • ribosome hibernation factors (RMF/HPF/RaiA) turns off protein synthesis

    Ribosome hibernation factors turn off protein synthesis during dormancy.

    • DOI:10.3389/fmicb.2024.1386179 Classical ribosome hibernation factors (RMF, HPF, YfiA) turn off protein synthesis.
  • ribosome hibernation factors (RMF/HPF/RaiA) protects ribosome

    Hibernation factor binding protects ribosomes from ribonuclease degradation.

    • DOI:10.3389/fmicb.2024.1386179 Hibernation factors directly block ribonucleases from entering the ribosome in response to starvation.
  • resuscitation-promoting factors (Rpf) promotes dormancy process RO:0002213

    Rpf proteins promote resuscitation (exit) of dormant/VBNC bacteria.

    • DOI:10.3390/microorganisms12081528 Rpfs reactivate dormant bacteria at very low concentrations.

Provenance

Source
METPO (2025-11-25)
Definition source
DOI:10.1038/nrmicro2504

Parent traits (1)

Children (2)

Synonyms (1)

  • dormant state RELATED_SYNONYM · DOI:10.1038/nrmicro2504

kg-microbe context

Matched 1 kg-microbe node via parent_proxy.

  • METPO:1000059 [-2.682, -2.070, -3.656, -0.652, …]

512-dim DeepWalkSkipGramEnsmallen embedding from kg-microbe (2026-04-25).

Nearest neighbors in embedding space

Top-8 cosine-similar METPO traits from the 2026-04-25 deepwalk (512-D).

Curation history

  1. · PROPOSED_FROM_RESEARCH · claude

    Proposed candidate PHYSIOLOGY axis class (dormancy) to parent the VBNC and persister-cell sub-variants.

  2. · CURATED_CAUSAL_GRAPH · claude

    Added evidence-backed causal graph (reversible dormancy) with GO node grounding and biolink/RO predicate groundings; promoted PROPOSED to REVIEWED.

  3. · ENRICH_CAUSAL_GRAPH · claude

    Added 6 evidence-backed generic edges (7 new nodes) from the deep-research report.

  4. · GROUND_CAUSAL_PREDICATES · claude

    Grounded 3 causal-edge predicate_id field(s) via mappings/predicate_grounding.tsv (RO:0002213×2, biolink:causes×1).

  5. · GROUND_CAUSAL_NODES · claude

    Grounded 2 causal-node grounding field(s) via mappings/node_grounding.tsv (GO:0006412×1, GO:0005840×1).