Rhizosphere microbiome associated with the two ecotypes of Andropogon gerardii

In our project we aimed to evaluate the effect of the of the host genetic on structuring the plant-associated soil-inhabiting microbiomes using an microbe inoculation experiment in the greenhouse settings. Three populations representing dry (from Hays, Kansas, 580 mm rainfall/year) and wet (from Carbondale, Illinois, 1167 mm rainfall/year) A. gerardii ecotypes were picked for the experiment. We cultured microbes from Hays and Carbondale soils, and reciprocally inoculated them into dry and wet ecotypes for 12 weeks in a greenhouse experiment. After the end of the experiment, we harvested the rhizosphere (roots and attached to the root soils) of the plants, and Illumina MiSeq-sequenced bacterial metabarcode PCR-amplicons together the inoculums and base soils used for the inoculums preparation. Using these sequence data, we evaluated the effect of the host genetics on structuring rhizosphere communities.Samples were submitted for sequencing in batches and were included in the different sequencing runs.Rhizosphere samples (RB) (n=168)were sequenced in three runs:120 samples - 2 x 300 cycles run48 x 2 samples - 2x250 cycles runBase soil samples (BS) (n=6) - 2 x 250 cyclesInoculum samples (IN (n=10) - 2 x 250 cyclesSince the same primers were used for every sample sets, the quality control and primer removal using DADA2 were performed separately to extract Amplicon Sequence Variants (ASVs). Samples then were merged together (total n = 232) and analyzed as one data set.