Soil moisture incidentally selects for microbes that facilitate locally adaptive plant response

We examined the role of the plant vs the environment in selecting for beneficial microbes to plants in their home moisture environment, in either wet vs dry conditions. To this end, we first conditioned soil microbial communities, selecting for either dry- or wet-adapted soil microbial communities, either with or without plants. After 3 plant generations, we conducted a full reciprocal transplant of each soil community onto wet- and dry-treated plants, using the soil from the prior 3 generations as an inoculum. From plants inoculated with these ‘evolved’ soils, we measured plant biomass and height. We also measured soil nitrogen of the inoculum, and measured inoculum respiration across a water content gradient. <br>本研究旨在探究在湿润与干旱两种本土湿度环境下，植物与环境各自在筛选对植物有益的微生物组时所发挥的作用。为此，我们首先对土壤微生物群落进行驯化，分别筛选出适应干旱或湿润环境的土壤微生物群落，实验设置有植物与无植物两种组别。经过3代植物种植后，我们以先前3代培育得到的土壤作为接种物，将所有土壤微生物群落完整互易移植到经湿润或干旱处理的植物上。对接种了这些经驯化演化的土壤的植物，我们测定了其生物量与株高。同时，我们测定了接种物的土壤氮含量，并在不同含水量梯度下测定了接种物的呼吸速率。