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Comparisons of diazotrophic communities in native and agricultural desert ecosystems reveal plants as important drivers in diversity.

ABSTRACT: Diazotrophs provide the only biological source of fixed atmospheric nitrogen in the biosphere. Although they are the key player for plant-available nitrogen, less is known about their diversity and potential importance in arid ecosystems. We investigated the nitrogenase gene diversity in native and agricultural desert soil as well as within root-associated microbiota of medicinal plants grown in Egypt through the combination of nifH-specific qPCR, fingerprints, amplicon pyrosequencing and fluorescence in situ hybridization-confocal laser scanning microscopy. Although the diazotrophic microbiota were characterized by generally high abundances and diversity, statistically significant differences were found between both soils, the different microhabitats, and between the investigated plants (Matricaria chamomilla L., Calendula officinalis L. and Solanum distichum Schumach. and Thonn.). We observed a considerable community shift from desert to agriculturally used soil that demonstrated a higher abundance and diversity in the agro-ecosystem. The endorhiza was characterized by lower abundances and only a subset of species when compared to the rhizosphere. While the microbiomes of the Asteraceae were similar and dominated by potential root-nodulating rhizobia acquired primarily from soil, the perennial S. distichum generally formed associations with free-living nitrogen fixers. These results underline the importance of diazotrophs in desert ecosystems and additionally identify plants as important drivers in functional gene pool diversity.

SUBMITTER: Koberl M

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4730177 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Comparisons of diazotrophic communities in native and agricultural desert ecosystems reveal plants as important drivers in diversity.

Köberl Martina M Erlacher Armin A Ramadan Elshahat M EM El-Arabi Tarek F TF Müller Henry H Bragina Anastasia A Berg Gabriele G

FEMS microbiology ecology 20151223 2

Diazotrophs provide the only biological source of fixed atmospheric nitrogen in the biosphere. Although they are the key player for plant-available nitrogen, less is known about their diversity and potential importance in arid ecosystems. We investigated the nitrogenase gene diversity in native and agricultural desert soil as well as within root-associated microbiota of medicinal plants grown in Egypt through the combination of nifH-specific qPCR, fingerprints, amplicon pyrosequencing and fluore ...[more]

PMID: 26705571

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Project description:Kuwait is a semi-arid region with soils that are relatively nitrogen-poor. Thus, biological nitrogen fixation is an important natural process in which N2-fixing bacteria (diazotrophs) convert atmospheric nitrogen into plant-usable forms such as ammonium and nitrate. Currently, there is limited information on free-living and root-associated nitrogen-fixing bacteria and their potential to fix nitrogen and aid natural plant communities in the Kuwait desert. In this study, free living N2-fixing diazotrophs were enriched and isolated from the rhizosphere soil associated with three native keystone plant species; Rhanterium epapposum, Farsetia aegyptia, and Haloxylon salicornicum. Root-associated bacteria were isolated from the root nodules of Vachellia pachyceras. The result showed that the strains were clustered in five groups represented by class: γ-proteobacteria, and α-proteobacteria; phyla: Actinobacteria being the most dominant, followed by phyla: Firmicutes, and class: β-proteobacteria. This study initially identified 50 nitrogen-fixers by16S rRNA gene sequencing, of which 78% were confirmed to be nitrogen-fixers using the acetylene reduction assay. Among the nitrogen fixers identified, the genus Rhizobium was predominant in the rhizosphere soil of R. epapposum and H. salicornicum, whereas Pseudomonas was predominant in the rhizosphere soil of F. aegyptia, The species Agrobacterium tumefaciens was mainly found to be dominant among the root nodules of V. pachyceras and followed by Cellulomonas, Bacillus, and Pseudomonas genera as root-associated bacteria. The variety of diazotrophs revealed in this study, signifying the enormous importance of free-living and root-associated bacteria in extreme conditions and suggesting potential ecological importance of diazotrophs in arid ecosystem. To our knowledge, this study is the first to use culture-based isolation, molecular identification, and evaluation of N2-fixing ability to detail diazotroph diversity in Kuwaiti desert soils.

Dataset Information

Comparisons of diazotrophic communities in native and agricultural desert ecosystems reveal plants as important drivers in diversity.

Publications

Comparisons of diazotrophic communities in native and agricultural desert ecosystems reveal plants as important drivers in diversity.

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