In this study, we examined the leaf endosphere microbiota of a suite of six teosinte and maize (Zea spp.) genotypes spanning the evolution of maize from teosintes (perennial and Balsas teosinte) to maize landraces (Fr. Mexico and United States) and maize elite inbreds (Fr. Mexico and United States). Through comparisons among those six genotypes we inferred on effects of transitioning from perennial to annual life history in the teosintes (perennial vs Balsas teosinte), domestication (Balsas teosinte vs Mexican landrace maize), northward spread (Mexican vs US landrace maize), and breeding (Mexican and US landrace vs Mexican and US inbred maize). In line with Anna Karenina principle predictions [37], [46], [40] we expected that teosinte’s transition from perennial to annual life history, and maize domestication, northward spread, and breeding would be associated with decreasing leaf endosphere bacterial community diversity and richness on one hand, and increasing variability in bacterial communities on the other hand. Importantly, we found that domestication in particular, evident both in comparisons between the Balsas teosinte and Mexican landrace genotypes, as well as between teosintes and maizes broadly, was associated with decreasing leaf endosphere bacterial diversity and increasing variability in bacterial communities. This suggested that dysbiosis is associated with maize domestication. Below, we discuss our results showing that maize domestication significantly affected α-diversity and β-diversity of the leaf endosphere microbial community, and other differences in the structure and assemblage of the leaf endosphere microbial community associated with maize domestication, northward spread, and breeding.
Maize domestication significantly affected α-diversity and β-diversityof leaf endosphere microbial community
We found that the Shannon and Chao1 diversity values in the Balsas teosinte genotype were higher than in the Mexican landrace genotype, and that generally they were higher in the teosintes compared to the maizes. We propose that the reductions are due to an increasing dominance of stochastic over deterministic processes mediating the leaf microbiome’s assemblage. The diversity decreases both in Mexican landrace maize and maizes combined relative to their predecessors indicate that the decreases are associated with domestication, and in parallel with a transition from plant survival and reproduction in a highly variable natural environment to a typically richer and more predictable agricultural environment [83], [84]. In contrast, there were no signficant changes in diversity associated with the transition from perennial to annual life history, northward maize spread, and breeding. To our knowledge, ours is the first study reporting a significant decay in leaf endosphere bacterial diversity and richness associated with maize domestication. Importantly, our study reveals significantly higher bacterial diversity and richness in the leaf endosphere of Balsas teosintes compared to the maize inbreds that serve as parents of commercial hybrid varieties, while highlighting a decline in bacterial diversity with likely implications for maize productivity in environments under stress from climate change.
Our PCoA analysis revealed a clear divergence between teosinte and maize in variation, in addition to diversity, associated with their leaf bacterial communities. In addition, our study highlighted distinct patterns in the clustering of teosintes, including perennial and Balsas teosinte, compared to the more variable distributions observed in maize landraces and elite inbreds. Notably, the beta diversity in leaf bacterial communities exhibited variations among plant groups, with teosinte displaying higher diversity in the leaf endosphere than the maize groups. Consistently, a previous study on the microbiome of wild and domesticated wheat species showed that the bacterial communities in the leaves of wild wheat species were more phylogenetically clustered compared to the bacterial communities in domesticated wheat [20]. In terms of the maize leaf endosphere microbiota study, previous studies have demonstrated no significant differences in the beta diversity of leaf-associated bacterial assemblages among modern maize cultivars [85], [86]. This is consistent with studies showing that host plants play important roles in shaping their endophytic bacteria communities [87], [86], [11], [88]. Thus, variation in the diversity between teosinte and maize plant groups in this study can be attributed to the selectiveness of the host plant. In addition, such selection may be correlated with host plant functional traits and ecological strategies [89], [90]. Any underlying mechanisms and consequences of diminished selection effect remain to be explored.
Collectively, we observed increased beta-diversity and decreased alpha-diversity in leaf-associated bacterial communities in the maize genotypes. This is potentially due to decreased selection and increased relevance of stochastic processes. Patterns similar to these are also noted in association with stress in plants and other hosts, including humans and animals [91], [92], [37], [93], [38]. For instance, mutations of immunity-related genes in Arabidopsis, and disease in Korean fir and chili pepper were associated with reductions in the diversity of their microbial communities [39], [46], [94]. Seemingly, hosts lose beneficial microbiota due to stochastic processes associated with stress. Additionally, the negative effects of stresses are compounded by dysbiosis, following Anna Karenina Principle predictions (AKP) [95], [96], [97]. AKP suggests a rise of stochastic over deterministic processes mediating microbial community composition within the holobiont [37], [98], [40]. The decline in diversity and increase in variability in the bacterial community of the maize leaf endosphere observed in this study are consistent with AKP and we suggest that the maize leaf endosphere is a dysbiotic microbiome. The decline in the diversity of microbial species in leaf endosphere of the maizes compared with the teosintes may impact the crop’s ability to cope with biotic and abiotic stresses [23], [99], particularly as environments change rapidly under climate change. Teosintes defend against herbivorous insects and pathogens by a variety of means [100], [101], [102], [103], [104], [105], [106], [107], and differences in defense strengths and strategies between teosinte and maize seem to be associated with their divergent environments, i.e. typically poorer, wild environments for the former and richer, agricultural environments for the latter [84], [51], [53]. Examining the diversity of leaf endosphere microbiota in wild crop relatives may provide insights to how traits that allow plants to survive in the wild can, alongside other enhancements, be utilized to improve the breeding process.
Differences in the structure and assemblage of leaf endosphere microbial community associated with maize domestication, northward spread, and breeding
We found that Bacteroidetes and Actinobacteria (both Proteobacteria) were the most dominant taxa in the leaf endosphere bacterial communities. Similar compositions have been found in studies of different plant varieties such as the phyllosphere microbiome of sorghum [108], leaf endosphere of prairie plants [109], and leaf microbiota of Arabidopsis [110]. Furthermore, we found several taxa were depleted from the teosinte group, including perennial and Balsas teosinte, to the maize inbred lines, including Devosia and Caulobacter (Proteobacteria), and Chitinophaga and Dyadobacter (Bacteroidetes). Moreover, five genera showed higher abundance in maize plant group, Pantoea, Staphylococcus, Acinetobacter, Corynebacterium, Ralstonia. These results are consistent with those of previous research [111] which identified Pantoea spp. as the dominant taxa in hybrid maize cultivars at an early growth stage. Similarly, our study highlighted Pantoea and Ralstonia as dominant taxa in leaf samples from elite inbred lines, including lines from Mexico and US. Additionally, Staphylococcus and Corynebacterium were also among the top 20 genera in the relative abundance analysis of that research [111]. Interestingly, the depleted genera observed in elite inbred maize in our study were also not detected in the previous research.
We identified a few OTUs as known beneficial bacteria, though we did not test their functional properties. For example, we identified Methylobacterium spp., which are well known phyllosphere colonizers with documented beneficial effects, e.g., production of phytohormones, and enhancement of seed germination and plant growth [112], [113], [114], [115]. Previous studies consistently reported Methylobacteriaceae as the most abundant or as a biomarker taxon for leaf microbiota studies in maize [116], [117], [11]. In our study, we did not observe Methylobacteriaceae as an indicator taxon among genotypesin LEfSe analysis, though they were found to be more abundant in the teosinte plant group than in Mexican and US elite inbred genotypes. Moreover, we identified that classes Xanthomonadales, Actinomycetales, Burkholderiales, Rhizobiales were enriched in the teosinte group and Mexican landrace genotype as potential biomarkers with different abundances. This is in line with Xion et al. [9] who found Actinobacteria, Burkholderiaceae, and Rhizobiaceae to be abundant in the phylloplane and rhizosphere of maize during the seedling stage, even if they were not identified as biomarker taxa. Many strains within those taxa establish beneficial partnerships with their host plants, including biological nitrogen fixation, plant growth stimulation, and protection against plant pathogens [118], [119], [120], [121], [122]. Our findings demonstrated that biomarker taxa of teosinte were significantly more enriched in that plant group when compared to elite inbred lines, suggesting that wild ancestors may harbor greater diversity of beneficial taxa than crops. Such enriched bacterial taxa may confer functional advantages to their host plants, including increased tolerance of biotic and abiotic stress and greater adaptability to new environments. Further study is needed to better understand the correlations and functions of these taxa in crop wild ancestors, as well as for harnessing them to improve plant growth and health in crops.
We found that the core microbiome consists of 36 taxa shared across six genotypes. The predominant classes within this central core microbiome were Alphaproteobacteria, Gammaproteobacteria, Actinobacteria, and Betaproteobacteria. The taxonomic affiliations observed in our findings are similar to those in other crop studies on the core microbiome of phyllosphere bacterial communities, e.g., tree leaves [89], grasses [123], and Arabidopsis thaliana [110]. Moreover, Johnston-Monje and Raizada [16] detected a core microbiota of endophytes that remained conserved in Zea seeds. Core microbial communities establish enduring relationships with plant hosts and crucially influence biological processes of their host plants [124], [125], [126]. Our finding provides insight into core bacteriome taxa in the leaf endosphere as shaoed by maize domestication and breeding. We suggest that a core bacterial community potentially coexists in mutual syntrophy, which provided a reproducible and conserved suite of taxa during maize domestication and breeding. Further studies are needed to understand the functions of the core bacterial community in relation to the biological functions of the maize host plant.
We constructed co-occurrence networks to explore the effects of domestication, northward spread, and breeding on microbe-microbe interactions across the different plant groups and genotypes. Network analysis provides metrics that allow an initial exploration of the dynamics of microbial interactions. For example, positive edges indicate connections with beneficial or cooperative interaction between nodes, negative edges indicate connections with antagonistic interactions between nodes, and average weighted degree indicates the typical strength of node connections and are useful for between-network comparisons [127], [128], [129]. Across plant genotypes positive edges were ca. 60-fold more frequent than negative edges; indeed, negative edges were nearly absent, except in perennial teosinte. Interestingly, the average number of positive edges across plant groups and genotypes, including Mexican maize and US maize (556.3) was > 4-fold greater than in Balsas teosinte (122). Average weighted degree was highest in the maize genotypes and lowest in Balsas teosinte; notably, it was > 3-fold higher in maize genotypes (average = 9.3) compared to Balsas teosinte (2.8). Finally, the number of nodes was highest in perennial teosinte, lowest in Mexican landrace maize and Balsas teosinte, and intermediate in US landrace, Mexican inbred, and US inbred maize. Perennial and Balsas teosinte exhibited opposite trends from each other in topological characteristics. In addition, Balsas teosinte showed differences in topological characteristics in the leaf endosphere networks compared to the maize plant groups. Negative edges were typically observed outside of the dense part of the network, plausibly indicating competition for resources among different assemblages or the release of antimicrobial substances by certain members through the assemblage interactions [130], [128], [131]. Leaf endosphere network complexity (edge density) among bacterial taxa seemed to decrease with the transition to annual life history in teosinte, whereas it increased with domestication and showed little change with maize's northward spread and breeding. The network complexity within Mexican and US maize inbred genotypes is similar to the pattern observed in one modern cultivar line in a study by Kong et al. [85], and at the seedling stage of modern maize cultivars in a study by Xiong et al [9]. Kong et al. identified differences as well in the network complexity of the phyllosphere bacterial community among modern maize cultivars. Studies comparing the network complexity of leaf endosphere microbial communities in teosintes and maizes are unavailable, so further investigation is needed to understand the differences between Balsas teosinte and maize plant groups in network analysis.
We used FAPROTAX analyses to evaluate potential functions of the microbiota of the different plant genotypes. While not conclusive, results from these analyses are useful for indicating future research directions concerning the functional ecology of endophytic bacteria and their host plants. Ecological functions and functional abundance of microbial communities can vary with plant type, plant development, and environment, among other variables [132], [11], [69], [133], [134]. Regulation of functional groups and shifts in functional groups indicate that plant-recruited microbes reflect the current needs of the host plant [132], [134]. The results of FAPROTAX suggested that nitrate reduction, nitrate respiration, fermentation, and cellulolytic activities were most prominent in the two teosinte genotypes, while nitrate reduction and fermentation were prominent among the four maize genotypes. The latter results align with findings from a previous study on maize hybrids [11]. Our findings provide predicted potential functions of the active microbial community in leaf endosphere. However, experimental research is essential to validate and confirm the predicted functional roles of these bacteria in enhancing plant fitness.