Fig 1.
Biofertilizer production overview.
Each production cycle spans 16 months. (A) It begins with soil sampling from natural ecosystems (1994), followed by mixing the soil with sterilized sand (three months). (B) Plants are germinated to host arbuscular mycorrhizae and bacteria (three months). (C) The resulting mixture of roots and substrate is then tested for its ability to promote plant growth (four months). (D) Plant-growth promoter consortia are selected and used as inoculum for (E) scale-up production and are kept through plant host rotation to foster microbial diversity. (F) Substrate samples are collected for sequencing analysis before drying, which promotes sporulation. (G) The roots and substrate are sun-dried and ground to produce the biofertilizer (four to five months). This production process helps develop effective biofertilizers with diverse microbial communities that promote sustainable agriculture.
Table 1.
Sequencing outputs and alpha diversity indexes.
Fig 2.
Biofertilizer’s overall diversity in substrates and plant-root association.
Phyla diversity of fungal (A) and bacterial communities (B) from the biofertilizer’s substrate or plant roots associated.
Fig 3.
Microbial consortia in biofertilizers.
The fungal species (A) and bacterial genera communities (B) present in the biofertilizer are depicted in Venn diagrams, illustrating the number of taxa exclusive to, and shared between, the substrate and the plant roots. Additionally, heat maps display the relative abundance of the most prevalent taxa.
Table 2.
Fungi with a role in plant growth promotion in the biofertilizer.
Fig 4.
A comprehensive model explains the biofertilizer’s observed bacterial and fungal diversity.
(A) Initially developed for fungi and bacteria, the consortia formation process involves introducing bacteria to the substrate through the first mycorrhizal fungi inoculum. (B) Subsequently, the plants actively select their fungal partners, reducing fungal diversity near the roots. Interestingly, the root-associated bacteria displayed greater diversity, likely due to the nutrient-rich environment created by the plant root exudates.
Table 3.
Bacteria with a role in plant growth promotion in the biofertilizer.