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Title: Relatively rare root endophytic bacteria drive plant resource allocation patterns and tissue nutrient concentration in unpredictable ways

Abstract

Plant endophytic bacterial strains can influence plant traits such as leaf area and root length. Yet, the influence of more complex bacterial communities in regulating overall plant phenotype is less explored. Here, in two complementary experiments, we tested whether we can predict plant phenotype response to changes in microbial community composition. In the first study, we inoculated a single genotype of Populus deltoides with individual root endophytic bacteria and measured plant phenotype. Next, data from this single inoculation were used to predict phenotypic traits after mixed three-strain community inoculations, which we tested in the second experiment. By itself, each bacterial endophyte significantly but weakly altered plant phenotype relative to noninoculated plants. In a mixture, bacterial strain Burkholderia BT03, constituted at least 98% of community relative abundance. Yet, plant resource allocation and tissue nutrient concentrations were disproportionately influenced by Pseudomonas sp. GM17, GM30, and GM41. We found a 10% increase in leaf mass fraction and an 11% decrease in root mass fraction when replacing Pseudomonas GM17 with GM41 in communities containing both Pseudomonas GM30 and Burkholderia BT03. Our results indicate that interactions among endophytic bacteria may drive plant phenotype over the contribution of each strain individually. Additionally, we have shown thatmore » low-abundance strains contribute to plant phenotype challenging the assumption that the dominant strains will drive plant function.« less

Authors:
ORCiD logo [1];  [2];  [2];  [3];  [2];  [4]
  1. Univ. of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN (United States); Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (United States)
  2. Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
  3. Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States); Johns Hopkins Univ., Baltimore, MD (United States)
  4. Univ. of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN (United States); Univ. of Vermont, Burlington, VT (United States)
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER)
OSTI Identifier:
1606051
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1572124
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC05-00OR22725; AC05‐00OR22725
Resource Type:
Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
American Journal of Botany
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 106; Journal Issue: 11; Journal ID: ISSN 0002-9122
Publisher:
Wiley - Botanical Society of America
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES; allocation; bacterial endophytes; Burkholderia; constructed communities; mass–ratio hypothesis; Populus deltoides; Pseudomonas plant traits; Salicaceae

Citation Formats

Henning, Jeremiah A., Weston, David J., Pelletier, Dale A., Timm, Collin M., Jawdy, Sara S., and Classen, Aimée T. Relatively rare root endophytic bacteria drive plant resource allocation patterns and tissue nutrient concentration in unpredictable ways. United States: N. p., 2019. Web. doi:10.1002/ajb2.1373.
Henning, Jeremiah A., Weston, David J., Pelletier, Dale A., Timm, Collin M., Jawdy, Sara S., & Classen, Aimée T. Relatively rare root endophytic bacteria drive plant resource allocation patterns and tissue nutrient concentration in unpredictable ways. United States. https://doi.org/10.1002/ajb2.1373
Henning, Jeremiah A., Weston, David J., Pelletier, Dale A., Timm, Collin M., Jawdy, Sara S., and Classen, Aimée T. Mon . "Relatively rare root endophytic bacteria drive plant resource allocation patterns and tissue nutrient concentration in unpredictable ways". United States. https://doi.org/10.1002/ajb2.1373. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1606051.
@article{osti_1606051,
title = {Relatively rare root endophytic bacteria drive plant resource allocation patterns and tissue nutrient concentration in unpredictable ways},
author = {Henning, Jeremiah A. and Weston, David J. and Pelletier, Dale A. and Timm, Collin M. and Jawdy, Sara S. and Classen, Aimée T.},
abstractNote = {Plant endophytic bacterial strains can influence plant traits such as leaf area and root length. Yet, the influence of more complex bacterial communities in regulating overall plant phenotype is less explored. Here, in two complementary experiments, we tested whether we can predict plant phenotype response to changes in microbial community composition. In the first study, we inoculated a single genotype of Populus deltoides with individual root endophytic bacteria and measured plant phenotype. Next, data from this single inoculation were used to predict phenotypic traits after mixed three-strain community inoculations, which we tested in the second experiment. By itself, each bacterial endophyte significantly but weakly altered plant phenotype relative to noninoculated plants. In a mixture, bacterial strain Burkholderia BT03, constituted at least 98% of community relative abundance. Yet, plant resource allocation and tissue nutrient concentrations were disproportionately influenced by Pseudomonas sp. GM17, GM30, and GM41. We found a 10% increase in leaf mass fraction and an 11% decrease in root mass fraction when replacing Pseudomonas GM17 with GM41 in communities containing both Pseudomonas GM30 and Burkholderia BT03. Our results indicate that interactions among endophytic bacteria may drive plant phenotype over the contribution of each strain individually. Additionally, we have shown that low-abundance strains contribute to plant phenotype challenging the assumption that the dominant strains will drive plant function.},
doi = {10.1002/ajb2.1373},
journal = {American Journal of Botany},
number = 11,
volume = 106,
place = {United States},
year = {Mon Oct 28 00:00:00 EDT 2019},
month = {Mon Oct 28 00:00:00 EDT 2019}
}

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Free Publicly Available Full Text
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Cited by: 6 works
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Figures / Tables:

Table 1 Table 1: Bacterial community relative abundances measured by qPCR Mean and (standard errors) for each bacterial strain in each treatment. Treatment = microbial community composition, 17 = Pseudomonas GM17, 30 = Pseudomonas GM30, 41 = Pseudomonas GM41, Bt = Burkholderia BT03.

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