About the Authors

J. J. Bull

bull@mail.utexas.edu

Affiliations Section of Integrative Biology, University of Texas, Austin, Texas, United States of America, Institute for Cellular and Molecular Biology, University of Texas, Austin, Texas, United States of America, Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, University of Texas, Austin, Texas, United States of America

Tim S. Jessop

Affiliation Department of Zoology, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia

Marvin Whiteley

Affiliations Section of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, University of Texas, Austin, Texas, United States of America, Institute for Cellular and Molecular Biology, University of Texas, Austin, Texas, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Performed the modeling: JB. Helped write the paper: JB TJ MW. Helped conceive of the idea: JB TJ MW. Provided information on dragon life histories: TJ. Provided information on bacterial natural history and culturing: MW.