Title Dissection of plant microbiota and plant-microbiome interactions
Author Kihyuck Choi1, Raees Khan2, and Seon-Woo Lee1*
Address 1Department of Applied Bioscience, Dong-A University, Busan 49315, Republic of Korea, 2Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Medical Sciences, Rawalpindi 46000, Pakistan
Bibliography Journal of Microbiology, 59(3),281–291, 2021,
DOI 10.1007/s12275-021-0619-5
Key Words plant microbiota, plant microbiome interaction, synthetic community
Abstract Plants rooted in soil have intimate associations with a diverse array of soil microorganisms. While the microbial diversity of soil is enormous, the predominant bacterial phyla associated with plants include Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Firmicutes, Proteobacteria, and Verrucomicrobia. Plants supply nutrient niches for microbes, and microbes support plant functions such as plant growth, development, and stress tolerance. The interdependent interaction between the host plant and its microbes sculpts the plant microbiota. Plant and microbiome interactions are a good model system for understanding the traits in eukaryotic organisms from a holobiont perspective. The holobiont concept of plants, as a consequence of co-evolution of plant host and microbiota, treats plants as a discrete ecological unit assembled with their microbiota. Dissection of plant-microbiome interactions is highly complicated; however, some reductionist approaches are useful, such as the synthetic community method in a gnotobiotic system. Deciphering the interactions between plant and microbiome by this reductionist approach could lead to better elucidation of the functions of microbiota in plants. In addition, analysis of microbial communities’ interactions would further enhance our understanding of coordinated plant microbiota functions. Ultimately, better understanding of plantmicrobiome interactions could be translated to improvements in plant productivity.