Reconsidering the ecological effect of seed endophytes in building plant microbial environments: lessons from a Chinese medicinal plant Panax notoginseng
Abstract Background Seed endophytes (SEs) are of particular interest in the fields of plant science, microbiology and agronomy due to their unique spatial and functional relationship with the host plant. SEs formed originally in mother plants, represent the majority of vertically transmitted endophy...
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BMC
2025-07-01
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| Series: | Environmental Microbiome |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1186/s40793-025-00753-y |
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| author | Yun Wen Wei-Xi Yang Yi-Qian Li Chun-Xi Lu Hong-Yan Hu Li-Rong Guo Shuang-Ye Huang Xiao-Xia Pan Shu-Sheng Zhu Ming-Zhi Yang |
| author_facet | Yun Wen Wei-Xi Yang Yi-Qian Li Chun-Xi Lu Hong-Yan Hu Li-Rong Guo Shuang-Ye Huang Xiao-Xia Pan Shu-Sheng Zhu Ming-Zhi Yang |
| author_sort | Yun Wen |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract Background Seed endophytes (SEs) are of particular interest in the fields of plant science, microbiology and agronomy due to their unique spatial and functional relationship with the host plant. SEs formed originally in mother plants, represent the majority of vertically transmitted endophytes (VTEs) in plants, and the inheritance of SEs by plants is a strategy to cope with environmental challenges. However, despite the growing interest in seed endophytes (SEs), our understanding of the host effects of SEs and their transmission remains limited. Here, seeds of a Chinese medicinal plant, pseudoginseng (Pg), were germinated and cultivated separately in autoclaved and natural guest soils under aseptic conditions, and the vertically transferred SEs (sVTEs) in the progeny plant endophytic and rhizospheric soil microbiomes were examined using an amplicon-based approach. Results We first categorized the detected Pg SE amplicon sequence variants (ASVs) into sVTEs and other SEs (nVTEs) based on the ASV overlap analyses, and an apparent taxa bias in sVTE was observed for both bacteria and fungi. Bacterial sVTEs are characteristically motile, biofilm forming and stress tolerant. The presence of soil-dwelling microbes did not prevent progeny plants from inheriting levels of sVTEs from seeds, but involved in shaping the composition of the acquired sVTEs. Most importantly, an aseptic cultivation experiment showed that the SEs alone were able to establish a high diversity of plant-associated microbiota (PAM) in progeny plants via vertical transmission; and sVTEs were acted as a core microbiota that dominated the assembly of the progeny PAM (with the relative abundances ranged from 21 to 79%) in both the natural and sterilized soil cultivation experiments. However, the impact of sVTEs on PAM assembly may be more significant than is currently recognized, given that proportions of SEs and sVTEs in plant seeds remain undetected due to technological limitations and small sample sizes. Conclusions The work has advanced our knowledge of the nature of sVTEs and the ecological effects of SEs on host plants. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-82086730eb1b4f0c9afb9c41f4bccc6b |
| institution | DOAJ |
| issn | 2524-6372 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-07-01 |
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| series | Environmental Microbiome |
| spelling | doaj-art-82086730eb1b4f0c9afb9c41f4bccc6b2025-08-20T03:06:06ZengBMCEnvironmental Microbiome2524-63722025-07-0120111710.1186/s40793-025-00753-yReconsidering the ecological effect of seed endophytes in building plant microbial environments: lessons from a Chinese medicinal plant Panax notoginsengYun Wen0Wei-Xi Yang1Yi-Qian Li2Chun-Xi Lu3Hong-Yan Hu4Li-Rong Guo5Shuang-Ye Huang6Xiao-Xia Pan7Shu-Sheng Zhu8Ming-Zhi Yang9School of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, Yunnan UniversitySchool of Food and Health, Beijing Technology and Business UniversitySchool of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, Yunnan UniversitySchool of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, Yunnan UniversitySchool of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, Yunnan UniversitySchool of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, Yunnan UniversitySchool of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, Yunnan UniversitySchool of Chemistry and Environment, Yunnan MinZu UniversityCollege of Plant Protection, Yunnan Agricultural UniversitySchool of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, Yunnan UniversityAbstract Background Seed endophytes (SEs) are of particular interest in the fields of plant science, microbiology and agronomy due to their unique spatial and functional relationship with the host plant. SEs formed originally in mother plants, represent the majority of vertically transmitted endophytes (VTEs) in plants, and the inheritance of SEs by plants is a strategy to cope with environmental challenges. However, despite the growing interest in seed endophytes (SEs), our understanding of the host effects of SEs and their transmission remains limited. Here, seeds of a Chinese medicinal plant, pseudoginseng (Pg), were germinated and cultivated separately in autoclaved and natural guest soils under aseptic conditions, and the vertically transferred SEs (sVTEs) in the progeny plant endophytic and rhizospheric soil microbiomes were examined using an amplicon-based approach. Results We first categorized the detected Pg SE amplicon sequence variants (ASVs) into sVTEs and other SEs (nVTEs) based on the ASV overlap analyses, and an apparent taxa bias in sVTE was observed for both bacteria and fungi. Bacterial sVTEs are characteristically motile, biofilm forming and stress tolerant. The presence of soil-dwelling microbes did not prevent progeny plants from inheriting levels of sVTEs from seeds, but involved in shaping the composition of the acquired sVTEs. Most importantly, an aseptic cultivation experiment showed that the SEs alone were able to establish a high diversity of plant-associated microbiota (PAM) in progeny plants via vertical transmission; and sVTEs were acted as a core microbiota that dominated the assembly of the progeny PAM (with the relative abundances ranged from 21 to 79%) in both the natural and sterilized soil cultivation experiments. However, the impact of sVTEs on PAM assembly may be more significant than is currently recognized, given that proportions of SEs and sVTEs in plant seeds remain undetected due to technological limitations and small sample sizes. Conclusions The work has advanced our knowledge of the nature of sVTEs and the ecological effects of SEs on host plants.https://doi.org/10.1186/s40793-025-00753-ySeed endophytesVertically transferred seed endophytes (sVTEs)Plant-associated microbiota (PAM)Ecological effect‘Market’ of sVTEPseudoginseng |
| spellingShingle | Yun Wen Wei-Xi Yang Yi-Qian Li Chun-Xi Lu Hong-Yan Hu Li-Rong Guo Shuang-Ye Huang Xiao-Xia Pan Shu-Sheng Zhu Ming-Zhi Yang Reconsidering the ecological effect of seed endophytes in building plant microbial environments: lessons from a Chinese medicinal plant Panax notoginseng Environmental Microbiome Seed endophytes Vertically transferred seed endophytes (sVTEs) Plant-associated microbiota (PAM) Ecological effect ‘Market’ of sVTE Pseudoginseng |
| title | Reconsidering the ecological effect of seed endophytes in building plant microbial environments: lessons from a Chinese medicinal plant Panax notoginseng |
| title_full | Reconsidering the ecological effect of seed endophytes in building plant microbial environments: lessons from a Chinese medicinal plant Panax notoginseng |
| title_fullStr | Reconsidering the ecological effect of seed endophytes in building plant microbial environments: lessons from a Chinese medicinal plant Panax notoginseng |
| title_full_unstemmed | Reconsidering the ecological effect of seed endophytes in building plant microbial environments: lessons from a Chinese medicinal plant Panax notoginseng |
| title_short | Reconsidering the ecological effect of seed endophytes in building plant microbial environments: lessons from a Chinese medicinal plant Panax notoginseng |
| title_sort | reconsidering the ecological effect of seed endophytes in building plant microbial environments lessons from a chinese medicinal plant panax notoginseng |
| topic | Seed endophytes Vertically transferred seed endophytes (sVTEs) Plant-associated microbiota (PAM) Ecological effect ‘Market’ of sVTE Pseudoginseng |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1186/s40793-025-00753-y |
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