Exploring the diversity of bacterial communities in halophyte rhizospheres across saline environments

Soil salinization is a global problem that affects more than 100 countries and about 8.7% of the planet's land area. Most agricultural crops do not tolerate high salt concentrations, but some plants, called halophytes, are naturally adapted to saline soils and have potential for soil desalination, human and animal food, medicine, and energy production. Studies show that microbial communities in the rhizosphere of halophytic plants play an important role in the adaptation of these species, assisting in salt tolerance and plant development. The use of environmental genomic DNA based techniques is essential to access these communities and understand their structure, diversity, and composition in the soil. The objective of this study was to analyze the structure, composition, diversity, cooccurrence, and role of bacterial communities in the rhizosphere of halophytic plants. For this, eDNA was extracted from rhizospheres in isolated niches and the 16S rRNA gene was partially sequenced using the Illumina MiSeq Next Generation Sequencing instrument.