Abstract Detail

Symbioses: Plant, Animal, and Microbe Interactions

Davidson, Bill Eugene [1], Smith, James F. [2], Serpe, Marcelo Daniel [3].

Community Structure of Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi Colonizing Artemisia tridentata Seedlings Following Inoculation and Transplanting.

Inoculation of seedlings with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) can alter the AMF taxa present in the roots after transplanting. This may occur even when native AMF is used as the inoculum because the environmental conditions and hosts that are used for AMF multiplication are different from those in natural habitats. The effect of inoculation on AMF composition was investigated in seedlings of Artemisia tridentata ssp. wyomingensis inoculated with native AMF. Seedlings were first grown in a greenhouse in sterilized soil (non-inoculated seedlings) or soil containing a mixture of native mycorrhizal species (inoculated seedlings). Three-month old seedlings were transplanted outdoors to 24 L pots filled with soil from a sagebrush habitat or to a recently burned sagebrush habitat. At the time of transplanting the percent colonization was negligible for non-inoculated seedlings and ranged between 24 to 81% for the inoculated ones. Three, 5, or 8 months after transplanting colonization was about twofold higher in inoculated than non-inoculated seedlings. To characterize the effect of inoculation on the AMF community, DNA was extracted from the roots and amplified with AMF specific primers. The AMF taxa were characterized based on sequences from the LSU-D2 rDNA region. A total of 6 phylotypes were identified, two within the Claroideoglomeraceae and four within the Glomeraceae. In addition, sequences were grouped into operational taxonomic units (OTUs) with sequence similarities higher than 94%. This resulted in the identification of 29 OTUs. Ordination analyses, using non-parametric multidimensional scaling, indicated that inoculation did not alter the structure of the AMF community. Individual seedlings, regardless of inoculation treatment, were simultaneously colonized by AMF belonging to 3 to 6 OTUs. The lack of significant differences in AMF communities among inoculation treatments appeared to have been related to the predominance of certain OTUs. In all experiments and treatments, four OTUs were dominant. Overall, the results indicate that the inoculum generated from native AMF contributed to the colonization of roots that developed after transplanting, resulting in higher levels of colonization than those naturally occurring in the soil without altering the AMF community.

1 - Boise State University, 1910 University Drive, Boise, Idaho, 83725-1515, United States
2 - Boise State University, Biological Sciences, 1910 University Drive, Boise, Idaho, 83725-1515, United States
3 - Boise State University, 1910 University Drive, Boise, ID, 83725-1515, USA

Keywords:
arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi
sagebrush
inoculation.

Presentation Type: Poster:Posters for Topics
Session: P
Location: Hall D/The Shaw Conference Centre
Date: Monday, July 27th, 2015
Time: 5:30 PM
Number: PSB002
Abstract ID:557
Candidate for Awards:None