Rhizosheath-associated Massilia contributes to maize growth heterosis

To investigate whether rhizosheath size functionally determines maize growth, we performed shotgun metagenomic sequencing to explore the functional differences associated with varying rhizosheath sizes. In this experiment, rhizosphere soil samples from the first whorl of crown roots of five genotypes were randomly selected from 4-week-old plants grown in a phytochamber.