Root hairs shape microbime structure and network interactions upon drought stress

摘要: Drought is one of the most serious abiotic stresses which also shifts the composition of root associated microbiomes. However, there is a lack of genetic evidence regarding whether and how plant genetic effects positively reshape drought induced microbiome changes. Root hairs play essential roles in water uptaking, but whether root hairs also orchestrate microbiome re-shaping process during drought stress is unknown. By utilizing genetic mutants with enhanced or decreased root hair densities, we detected a significant effect of plant genetic effect on drought induced microbiome changes. In addition, the hairy mutant (gl2) triggers a deterministic process during drought induced microbiome re-assembly, which further confirms the involvement of host effects in re-shaping drought induced microbiome changes. Rhizobiaceae strains were detected as key biomarker species positively correlated with root hair densities. Moreover, the gl2 mutant also shapes more complex microbiome co-occurrence networks, with more Rhizobiaceae hubs. Our findings unveil the novel roles of root hairs in shaping microbiome structure and network interactions upon drought stress, particularly through regulating the abundance and network centrality of Rhizobiaceae strains. Root hair related mutants also broadly affect root metabolome upon drought stress. Understanding the physiological and microbial ecological basis of host mediated microbiome re-shaping under drought helps develop microbiome engineering approaches to combat climate changes.