Plant-associated prokaryotic communities in PHC contaminated soil

A long-term phytoremediation experiment was initiated in Interior Alaska in 1995 with the introduction of grasses and/or fertilizer to petroleum hydrocarbon (PHC)-contaminated soils that were subsequently left unmanaged. Metataxonomic analysis performed using 16S rRNA gene sequencing and subsequent bioinformatic analyses revealed that the original type of contaminated soil and phytoremediation strategy influenced the structure of both rhizospheric and endophytic communities of colonizing plants, even after 20 years since the treatments were applied and following the disappearance of the originally planted grasses