21EJP SOIL: Tuning the wheat root microbiome to improve soil health and optimize rhizosphere nitrogen cycling and availability

支持和改善农业土壤的肥力和健康对人类的生存至关重要。小麦的种植和氮肥的施用等相关农业实践影响着全球近2.2亿公顷的农业土壤。因此，调整小麦生产对土壤健康影响的可能性将推动我们开发更可持续的农业方法，保护和增强土壤健康。小麦根系性状与其结构和渗出物的释放有关，形成了土壤和微生物环境。这影响到与生物多样性、土壤结构和向作物提供必需养分有关的土壤特性和微生物群功能，这些都是土壤健康的关键方面。现代小麦品种是集中培育地上性状（如产量）的结果，很少关注其对根系性状和土壤过程的影响。这一缺陷使得迫切需要确定能够支持和改善土壤健康和关键生态系统功能（如养分循环和食物供应）的地下特征。土壤健康在很大程度上取决于土壤-微生物-植物的相互作用。在专门用于小麦生产的农业土壤中，作物对微生物氮循环的控制有可能在提供更可持续的农业方面发挥关键作用，这些农业需要更少的化肥投入。重点培育能够改善土壤健康的作物，从而保持植物吸收氮的最佳平衡，这并不是育种者的目标，尽管可以获得好处。优化氮肥管理和减少氮素流失到环境中的战略可以为联合国战略发展目标（sdg）做出重大贡献，这些目标涉及更可持续地利用生态系统，阻止和扭转土地退化和生物多样性丧失（SDG15），以及提供负责任的生产（SDG12）和减缓全球变暖（SDG13）。总而言之，WISH-ROOTS项目的主要目标是通过小麦根系性状恢复和保持土壤健康。为此，我们的目标是：1)确定与根际微生物行会功能相关的关键特征和根系结构特征；2)寻找小麦有益土壤健康的基因、基因组区域或代谢途径；3)开发遗传育种工具，将这些有益性状引入商业品种；4)开发土壤健康预测模型。这些目标将为农民提供有利品种，支持更可持续地利用土地，改善土壤微生物多样性、养分循环和结构。

Supporting and improving the fertility and health of agricultural soils is essential to the survival of humanity. The cultivation of wheat and associated agricultural practices such as application of nitrogen (N)-fertilizers impacts on nearly 220 million ha of agricultural soil globally. Therefore, the possibility of tuning the impact of wheat production on soil health will advance our efforts to develop more sustainable agricultural approaches, preserving and enhancing soil health.Wheat root traits linked to their architecture and the release of exudates shape the soil and microbiome environment. This impacts on soil properties and microbiome functions related to biodiversity, soil structure and provision of essential nutrients to crops, key aspects of soil health.Modern wheat varieties are the result of intensive breeding for above ground traits (e.g. yield) with little attention paid to their impact on root traits and on soil processes. This deficiency has created an urgent need to identify below ground traits that can support and improve soil health and key ecosystem functions such as nutrient cycling and provision of food.Soil health strongly depends on soil-microbe-plant interactions. In agricultural soils dedicated to wheat production, crop control of microbial N cycling has the potential to play a crucial role in providing more sustainable farming that requires lower inputs of chemical fertilizer. A focus on breeding crops that can improve soil health, thus maintaining an optimized balance of N species available for plant uptake, has not been a target for breeders despite the benefits that can be reaped.Strategies to optimize the management of N fertilization and reduce N losses to the environment can significantly contribute to UN Strategic Development Goals (SDGs) dealing with more sustainable use of ecosystems and halting and reversing land degradation and biodiversity loss (SDG15) as well as providing responsible production (SDG12) and global warming mitigation (SDG13).To summarise, the main objective of the WISH-ROOTS project is to restore and and preserve soil health through wheat root traits. For this, we aim to: 1) identify key traits associated with functionality of microbial guilds in the rhizosphere and root system architectural traits; 2) find the genes, genomic regions or metabolic pathways in wheat that benefit soil health; 3) develop genetic tools for breeding to introduce these beneficial traits in commercial cultivars and 4) develop a predictive model for soil health. These aims will provide advantageous varieties for farmers that support a more sustainable use of land improving soil microbial biodiversity, nutrient cycling, and structure.