Histochemical study of nitrogen-transfer endosymbiosis

Plant roots have the best-understood mutualisms with microbes, but leaf and bract cell endosymbiosis have not been previously reported. Leaf and bract cells of more than 30 species in 18 families of seed plants were surveyed for the presence of intracellular bacteria and several experiments were designed to find and analyze nutrient exchanges between bacteria and plant cells. This dataset contains the results of 1) histochemical analyses to detect hormones, superoxide, and nitrogenous chemicals around bacteria within plant leaf and bract cells, 2) experiments to assess the differential absorption of isotopic nitrogen into plants, and 3) genetic analysis of bacteria isolated from plant material.