Abstract
Little is known about how bacterial endophyte communities may vary from one tree to another of the same species. We sampled nine standardized replicates from the green stems of an ethnomedicinal tropical tree, Santiria apiculata, in a Malaysian rainforest, to investigate endophyte variation from one plant to another. DNA was extracted axenically from the inner stem, and PCR-amplified for the 16s rRNA gene, followed by Illumina HiSeq sequencing. For comparison, the rhizosphere soil of the same trees was also sampled, and the 16s rRNA genes sequenced. Santiria stems contained a diverse community of more than 1100 Operational Taxonomic Units (OTUs), which partitioned clearly into two community types. One community (here dubbed ‘rhizosphere-like’) resembled the rhizosphere soil in its major OTUs, while the other (‘rhizosphere-unlike’) was more distinct and dominated by the genus Bacillus. Nestedness analysis confirmed that both the rhizosphere-like and the rhizosphere-unlike stem communities tended to be a subset of the rhizosphere community. The β-nearest taxon index (βNTI) analysis revealed that the stem communities were dominated by stochastic processes, whereas deterministic processes with homogenizing selection dominated the rhizosphere soil. It appears that the endophyte community in Santiria may be dominated by colonization and priority effects, and it may derive from the rhizosphere community. The potential for alternate steady states within the endophyte community should be considered as a possible influence on plant growth and ecology.
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Acknowledgements
We are grateful to the University Kebangsaan University Forest Reserve and Herbarium staff. We thank Muhanna Al-Shabanni, Aishah Ismail, Radhiah Binti Khairon, and Nur Faizah Abu Bakar, for their assistance during sampling. This work was funded by the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Research Grant (GUP 2015-042). E.H, N.M.Z and J.M.A design the work, E.H did the sampling, microbial DNA extraction. E.H, H.C, J.A.M analysed the work, manuscript written by all authors. Emmanuel Haruna was a Ph.D. scholar at UKM sponsored by the Tertiary Education TrustFund (TETFUND), Nigeria.
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This work was funded by the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Research Grant (GUP 2015–042).
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EH, NMZ and JA conceived the research questions and designed the project. The field sampling was done by EH, NMZ and JA. EH performed the lab experiments. EH and HC processed the sequences at different stages. EH, HC, JA did all the data analysis. EH, NMZ, and JA prepared all the draft versions and wrote the main manuscript text. HC contributed to preparing the draft and advised on the work. All of the authors reviewed, contributed to revisions and accepted the final version of the manuscript.
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Haruna, E., Zin, N.M., Cho, H. et al. Alternate states dominate the bacterial endophyte community of a tropical tree. Environmental Sustainability 4, 785–796 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42398-021-00198-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42398-021-00198-2