Microbial assemblages of Schisandraceae plants and the correlations between endophytic species and the accumulation of secondary metabolites

• Published in: Plant and soil Vol. 483; no. 1-2; pp. 85 - 107
• Main Authors: Qin, Dan, You, Chuan, Lan, Wenyi, Wang, Yumeng, Yu, Baohong, Peng, Yajun, Xu, Jieru, Dong, Jinyan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer International Publishing 01.02.2023; Springer; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Accumulation; Agriculture; Assembly; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Community composition; Composition; Correlation coefficient; Correlation coefficients; Ecology; Endophytes; Environmental aspects; Flavonoids; Fungi; Herbal medicine; Life Sciences; Lignans; Medicinal plants; Metabolism; Metabolites; Microbial activity; Microbiomes; Microorganisms; Physiological aspects; Plant Physiology; Plant Sciences; Polyphenols; Research Article; Schisandra; Schisandraceae; Secondary metabolites; Soil microorganisms; Soil Science & Conservation; Symbiosis; Triterpenoids; China; Endophytes; Rhizosphere; Plant microbiome; Secondary metabolites; Schisandraceae; Diversity
• ISSN: 0032-079X; 1573-5036
• DOI: 10.1007/s11104-022-05729-2

Aims Schisandraceae are medicinal plants with significant medicinal and economic value. However, little is known about the microbiota assembly of Schisandraceae plants and the relationship between endophytic species and the accumulation of secondary metabolites. Methods In this study, we characterized the bacterial and fungal communities in different compartments of Schisandra sphenanthera and Kadsura angustifolia by 16S/ITS amplicon sequencing. The prediction of the metabolic potential and measurement of specific metabolites were conducted, as well as the correlation with endophytic species was estimated. Results A total of 744,162 bacterial and 641,388 fungal amplicon sequence variants were obtained and taxonomically grouped into 44 and 16 different phyla, respectively. Community diversity and composition analyses showed that the two Schisandraceae plants had similar and unique endophytic microbial communities compared with soil microorganisms. Furthermore, PICRUSt and FUNGuild predictive analysis indicated that host-associated functions were associated with metabolic processing. Therefore, the correlations between the five active components (polyphenols, flavonoids, sugars, triterpenoids and lignans) and endophytes of S. sphenanthera and K. angustifolia were investigated. Diverse relationships including positive and negative correlation were found among chemicals and endophytes based on correlation coefficient matrices, which suggested that the accumulation of secondary metabolites in Schisandraceae plants is closely related to the endophytes community composition. Conclusions Our results demonstrated the differences in the co-occurrence patterns and assembly processes of microbiomes across the multiple plant niches in Schisandraceae plants, which were closely associated with secondary metabolites. These findings present new opportunities to deeply understand plant-microbial symbioses and secondary metabolite productions.