Temporal dynamics of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi in maize root: Influence of cover crops and microbial inoculantion

This dataset contains Illumina MiSeq paired-end amplicon sequences of root-associated arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) generated from a two-year field experiment in Asendorf, Lower Saxony, Germany. The study evaluated the effects of a cover crop mixture and microbial inoculation on AMF colonization, community composition, and maize (Zea mays L. cv. MOVANNA) performance. Before maize sowing, field plots were either sown with a cover crop mixture or left fallow. Maize seeds were coated with AMF and rhizobacteria (AMF+BAK) or left uninoculated (control). Root samples were collected at three maize growth stages (vegetative, reproductive, maturity) in 2022 and 2023. DNA was extracted from maize roots, and the SSU rRNA gene region was amplified with AMF-specific primers NS31 and AML2. Sequencing was performed on an Illumina MiSeq (Reagent Kit v3, paired-end). Bioinformatic processing included primer removal (cutadapt v3.5), quality filtering (fastp v0.21.0), read merging (pear v0.9.6), ASV generation and chimera removal (vsearch v2.15.0), taxonomic assignment (MaarjAM database), and functional annotation (FunGuild v1.1). The dataset includes raw sequence reads (FASTQ files) for each sample and associated metadata describing experimental treatments (cover crop, inoculation), year, and maize growth stage.