Testing how interactions between plants and soil microbes influence plant community structure along a climatic gradient

测试植物和土壤微生物之间的相互作用如何影响气候梯度上的植物群落结构

• 批准号: 1754287
• 负责人: Kerri Crawford
• 金额: $ 64.7万
• 依托单位: University of Houston
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2018-07-01 至 2024-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1754287&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Testing; how; interactions; between; plants

All plants live with a huge number and diversity of tiny organisms, called microbes. Some help plants by providing nutrients, whereas others can have negative effects like causing disease. Ecologists now believe that some microbes in the soil can determine which plant species can grow in a particular place and how common those plants can become. Thus, microbes may be an invisible force determining the health of many plants, including those we depend on for food. Practically all microbes are sensitive to changes in the environment. This is important because changes in weather -- decreased rainfall, for example -- could greatly affect which microbes thrive in the soil and therefore the abundance and distribution of plants. Plants, in turn, may determine the presence or absence of certain microbes in the soil, thereby creating a complicated situation in which plants and microbes affect each other's success. This idea of "plant-soil feedback" is a relatively new way of thinking about what plants need and their living arrangements with microbes. This research will test how sensitive soil microbes are to soil moisture and, in turn, how that sensitivity may impact plants. The investigator will compare plant and microbial communities along a gradient of rainfall in Texas and will explore how native and non-native plant species differ in their interactions with microbes along that gradient. Results of this work will have direct applications for predicting and mitigating the effects of drought on an economically and culturally important ecosystem, Texas grasslands. This research will also provide training opportunities for the next generation of scientists, including students from underrepresented groups at the University of Houston, a Hispanic Serving Institution. The investigator will share her experiences with children in under-served public schools and will lead educational workshops through local non-profit agencies.This project has three major components. First, a greenhouse experiment will test how water availability influences plant-soil feedback among native and non-native plant species. The experiment will be paired with root microscopy and DNA sequencing to identify candidate microbial taxa underlying plant-soil feedback effects, a critical, but often lacking step in generalizing plant-soil feedback responses. Second, a precipitation-manipulation experiment in the field will test, for the first time, whether changes in plant-soil feedback can predict changes in plant community composition in the different precipitation treatments. Third, a reciprocal soil transplant experiment will test for generality in plant-soil feedback responses across a natural precipitation gradient in Texas, which will provide insights into whether plant-soil feedback responses to climate may depend on historical climate legacies. Given plant-soil feedback theory's success at integrating plant-microbe interactions into the framework of plant community ecology, deeper insights into the factors that influence plant-soil feedback may transform our understanding of how plant communities are structured and plant diversity is maintained.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

所有的植物都生活在大量多样的微小生物体中，称为微生物。 有些通过提供营养来帮助植物，而另一些则会产生负面影响，如引起疾病。 生态学家现在认为，土壤中的一些微生物可以决定哪些植物物种可以在特定的地方生长，以及这些植物的常见程度。 因此，微生物可能是一种无形的力量，决定了许多植物的健康，包括我们赖以为生的植物。 几乎所有的微生物都对环境的变化很敏感。 这一点很重要，因为天气的变化--例如降雨量的减少--会极大地影响土壤中的微生物，从而影响植物的丰度和分布。 反过来，植物可能决定土壤中某些微生物的存在或不存在，从而创造了一个复杂的情况，植物和微生物相互影响对方的成功。 这种“植物-土壤反馈”的想法是一种相对较新的思考植物需要什么以及它们与微生物的生活安排的方式。 这项研究将测试土壤微生物对土壤水分的敏感程度，以及这种敏感性对植物的影响。 研究人员将比较植物和微生物群落沿着在得克萨斯州的降雨梯度，并将探讨如何本地和非本地植物物种在他们的相互作用与微生物沿着该梯度不同。 这项工作的结果将直接应用于预测和减轻干旱对经济和文化重要的生态系统，得克萨斯州草原的影响。这项研究还将为下一代科学家提供培训机会，包括来自休斯顿大学（一个西班牙裔服务机构）代表性不足群体的学生。调查员将与服务不足的公立学校的儿童分享她的经验，并将通过当地非营利机构领导教育讲习班。首先，温室实验将测试水的可用性如何影响本地和非本地植物物种之间的植物-土壤反馈。该实验将与根显微镜和DNA测序配对，以确定潜在的植物-土壤反馈效应的候选微生物类群，这是推广植物-土壤反馈反应的关键但往往缺乏的步骤。第二，在现场的降水操纵实验将测试，第一次，植物-土壤反馈的变化是否可以预测在不同的降水处理植物群落组成的变化。第三，互惠土壤移植实验将测试在得克萨斯州的自然降水梯度，这将提供洞察植物土壤反馈反应的气候是否可能取决于历史气候遗产的植物土壤反馈反应的一般性。鉴于植物-土壤反馈理论在将植物-微生物相互作用纳入植物群落生态学框架方面的成功，深入了解影响植物生长的因素土壤反馈可能会改变我们对植物群落结构和植物多样性维持的理解。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过利用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响进行评估，被认为值得支持审查标准。

项目成果

Causes and consequences of differences in soil and seed microbiomes for two alpine plants

• DOI: 10.1007/s00442-022-05271-z
• 发表时间: 2022-10
• 期刊: Oecologia
• 影响因子: 2.7
• 作者: N. Luecke;C. P. B. de Mesquita;Madeline Luong;S. K. Schmidt;K. Suding;K. Crawford

Relationships between plant–soil feedbacks and functional traits

• DOI: 10.1111/1365-2745.13731
• 发表时间: 2021-05
• 期刊: Journal of Ecology
• 影响因子: 5.5
• 作者: Nianxun Xi;P. Adler;Dong-wei Chen;Hangyu Wu;J. Catford;P. Bodegom;M. Bahn;K. Crawford;Chengjin Chu

Soil microbes weaken the positive effect of an aquatic–terrestrial subsidy on plant performance

• DOI: 10.1093/jpe/rtaa079
• 发表时间: 2020-11
• 期刊: Journal of Plant Ecology
• 影响因子: 2.7
• 作者: Alejandra García;Hannah Locke;K. Crawford

Climate Disruption of Plant-Microbe Interactions

• DOI: 10.1146/annurev-ecolsys-011720-090819
• 发表时间: 2020-11
• 期刊: Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics
• 作者: Jennifer A. Rudgers;Michelle E. Afkhami;Lukas Bell-Dereske;Y. A. Chung;K. Crawford;S. Kivlin;Michael Mann;Martin A. Nuñez

First Report of Powdery Mildew Caused by Podosphaera xanthii on the Invasive Verbena brasiliensis in Texas

德克萨斯州入侵巴西马鞭草上首次报道由黄豆球菌 (Podosphaera xanthii) 引起的白粉病

• DOI: 10.1094/pdis-01-20-0022-pdn
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: Plant Disease
• 影响因子: 4.5
• 作者: Luecke, N. C.;Adams, T.;Crawford, K. M.
• 通讯作者: Crawford, K. M.