Bacterial microbiome of Pinus sylvestris roots colonised by different ectomycorrhizal fungi. Ectomycorrhiza associated bacterial communities

Symbiotic ectomycorrhizal tree roots represent an important niche for interaction with bacteria since the fungi colonising them have a large surface area and receive a direct supply of photosynthetically derived carbon. We examined individual root tips of Pinus sylvestris at defined time points between 5 days and 24 weeks, identified the dominant fungi colonising each root tip using Sanger sequencing and the bacterial communities colonising individual root tips by 454 pyrosequencing. Bacterial colonisation was extremely dynamic with statistically significant variation in time and increasing species richness until week 16 (3477 OTUs). Bacterial community structure of roots colonised by Russula sp. 6 GJ-2013b, Piloderma spp., Meliniomyces variabilis and Paxillus involutus differed significantly at weeks 8 and 16 but diversity declined and significant differences were no longer apparent at week 24. The most common genera were Burkholderia, Sphingopyxsis, Dyella, Pseudomonas, Acinetobacter, Actinospica, Aquaspirillum, Acidobacter Gp1, Sphingomonas, Terriglobus, Enhydrobacter, Herbaspirillum and Bradyrhizobium. Many genera had high initial abundance at week 8, declining with time but Dyella and Terriglobus increased in abundance at later time points. In roots colonised by Piloderma spp. several other bacterial genera, such as Actinospica, Bradyrhizobium, Acidobacter Gp1 and Rhizomicrobium appeared to increase in abundance at later sampling points.