Assessing the impact of successive soil cultivation on Meloidogyne enterolobii infection and soil bacterial assemblages

Abstract

Soil cultivation may change the soil microbiome and alter interactions between plants and parasites. This work aimed to evaluate temporal changes in plant health, soil microbiome abundance and incidence of the emergent plant‐parasitic nematode, Meloidogyne enterolobii, in two soil fields with different agricultural uses. Soil samples were collected from a commercial tomato production field (agricultural soil) and a single‐cultivation strawberry field (native soil) for two successive years. Tomato plants cv. Early Girl were grown in a greenhouse, and three groups of inoculums were used: Fusarium only, M. enterolobii only and Fusarium + M. enterolobii. After 45 days, plants were evaluated for growth parameters and nematode reproduction and soil bacterial assemblages were assessed using cultivation‐independent sequencing methods (V3/V4 region of the 16S rRNA). Among both soil types, the average root fresh weight increased (56%), along with shoot fresh weight (82%) and fruit fresh weight (76%) in the second year. Moreover, there was an 80.5% decrease in eggs present per root system from the first year to the second. The relative abundance of bacterial assemblages from Year 1 to Year 2 changed for most of the top phyla (e.g., Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes and Chloroflexi) and genera (e.g., Bacillus, Streptomyces and Flavisolibacter). This study suggests that soil management and year‐to‐year variation can lead to a shift in overall bacterial assemblages, better crop yield and an overall decrease in nematode reproduction.

The Underground World of Plant Disease: How Does Rhizosphere Dysbiosis Affect Plant Health Above-ground?

“…The impact of soil and rhizosphere microbiome on soilborne diseases in plants is well-established (Lee et al 2021, Pasche et al 2023), demonstrating the significant role of below-ground microbial communities in plant health and disease resistance. However, our understanding of how these soil-root microbiome dynamics influence above-ground diseases, particularly foliar diseases, is still underexplored (Trivedi et al 2020).…”

The underground world of plant disease: Rhizosphere dysbiosis reduces above‐ground plant resistance to bacterial leaf spot and alters plant transcriptome

“…The impact of soil and rhizosphere microbiome on soil-borne diseases in plants is well-established (Lee et al, 2021;Pasche et al, 2023), demonstrating the significant role of below-ground microbial communities in plant health and disease resistance. However, our understanding of how these soil-root microbiome dynamics influence above-ground diseases, particularly foliar diseases, is still underexplored (Trivedi et al, 2020).…”