Fig 1.
Buffelgrass seeds germinated in a chamber and, after two days, transferred to peat moss-filled pots. After 70 days, the plants were transplanted into PVC pots containing silica and soil (1:1) from Rancho Diamante, Sonoran Desert. The plants were then divided into three groups, each with four replicates. Group (A) was watered with sterilized distilled water, Group (B) was watered with a solution of aqueous leachates from leaves and stems, and Group (C) were watered with distilled water but exposed to root exudates from another buffelgrass plant. Sampling was done at two different periods, 20 and 40 days, with two replicates from each group being analyzed at each time.
Table 1.
Alpha diversity for buffelgrass microbiomes.
Fig 2.
Buffelgrass microbiome at the phylum level.
Each sample is labeled indicating control (C), exudates (E), leachates (L), soil (S), and sampling time (T1 and T2).
Fig 3.
Beta diversity of the buffelgrass microbiome.
(A) Dendrogram of microbiome relatedness based on an unweighted UniFrac distance matrix (A). (B) Beta diversity of the buffelgrass microbiome is represented as a constrained analysis of principal coordinates (CAP) based on an unweighted UniFrac distance matrix for all treatments and natural soils (B). Vectors display the experiment’s different treatments and time points. Statistical significance was evaluated using the ANOSIM test for treatments (p = 0.092) and time (p = 0.0366).
Fig 4.
Enriched bacterial genera in allelochemical treatments.
Shown are (A) the log2fold ratio between T1 and T2 (A), (B) exudates and leachates (B), (C)exudates and controls (C), and (D) leachates and controls (D). DESeq2 was used to get the significantly enriched genera in each condition using an α = 0.01.
Fig 5.
Buffelgrass core microbiome at the genus level.
In the heatmap, genera marked with stars comprise the buffelgrass core microbiome. We collapsed genera with low abundances (< 0.03%).