Damaged marsh grass leaves host way more microbes than healthy ones
Rolando JL, Carnes AL, Hodges M, Joesting H, Kostka JE
Native Plants
Salt marshes built on this one grass species protect coastlines from storm surge and filter water, so understanding how its leaf microbes shift during dieback events could point toward ways to help struggling marshes bounce back.
Spartina alterniflora is the tall grass that forms the backbone of salt marshes along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, but patches of it have been mysteriously dying off. Researchers compared healthy and damaged leaves and found that damaged ones were crawling with more bacteria and fungi, and a greater variety of them, than healthy leaves, suggesting microbes rush in once a leaf is wounded. They also found that greenhouse-grown plants had far fewer microbes than wild marsh plants, showing that this grass picks up most of its leaf microbiome from its environment rather than inheriting it from seed.
Key Findings
Damaged Spartina alterniflora leaves showed higher microbial abundance and greater alpha diversity (both prokaryotic and fungal) than healthy leaves, indicating microbial proliferation follows leaf damage.
Greenhouse-raised plants had the lowest microbial abundance and Shannon diversity for both bacterial and fungal communities, showing the phyllosphere microbiome is acquired largely through horizontal transmission from the natural environment rather than from seed.
Plant origin (greenhouse vs. natural marsh), health status (healthy vs. damaged), and phenotype (short vs. tall Spartina) all independently shaped microbial community composition in the phyllosphere.
chevron_right Technical Summary
Scientists found that when the marsh grass Spartina alterniflora gets damaged by disease or environmental stress, its leaf microbiome goes into overdrive, hosting more and more diverse microbes than healthy leaves. This matters because this grass is the backbone of coastal salt marshes, and understanding how it responds to damage could help efforts to restore dying marsh ecosystems.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
Leaf damage is associated with alteration of microbiome composition and abundance in the Spartina alterniflora phyllosphere.
Spartina alterniflora, the dominant plant species in salt marshes along the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico coastlines of the Americas, is affected by disease and sudden vegetation dieback. Despite the...
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Sporobolus alterniflorus, or synonymously known as Spartina alterniflora, the smooth cordgrass, saltmarsh cordgrass, or salt-water cordgrass, is a perennial deciduous grass which is found in intertidal wetlands, especially estuarine salt marshes. It has been reclassified as Sporobolus alterniflor...