New Framework for Plant Adaptation and Ecosystem Resilience

A new study from Northern Arizona University suggests that, under certain conditions, plants may influence the composition of their microbiomes. They do this by promoting beneficial microorganisms and suppressing harmful ones, allowing them to better adapt to their environment. These findings have implications for sustainable agriculture and improve our understanding of how ecosystems respond to environmental changes.

The study was conducted by Regents Professor Nancy Collins Johnson of NAU’s School of Earth and Sustainability and Professor César Marín of Universidad Santo Tomás in Chile.

Plants host a microbiome in and around their roots. This includes fungi, bacteria, viruses, and other microorganisms. These microbes help plants absorb water and nutrients from the soil and offer protection against stress and disease.

For years, efforts have been made to commercialize microbial products to improve plant health. However, these products often do not produce consistent or expected results in real-world conditions.

One possible explanation is Functional Team Selection (FTS). FTS views the plant and its microbiome as an integrated system of interacting organisms and viruses.

In some environments, functional microbiome teams may emerge to support plant survival and growth. When resources are limited, and if there is enough time and microbial diversity, plants and fungi in natural settings may form cooperative relationships that promote plant development.

Functional teams are unlikely to evolve in benign environments with no stress and ample resources because they lack the selection pressure that is required to curate the composition of the microbiome. Evidence for FTS can be seen in studies showing that fertilization of natural vegetation often reduces mycorrhizal benefits by removing the essential selection pressure.

Nancy Collins Johnson, Professor, Northern Arizona University

Functional Team Selection is based on ecological and evolutionary principles. It draws on the recently proposed Law of Increasing Functional Information, which explains how function and selection drive the development of systems across the universe.

Although FTS was developed to study the evolution and function of plants and their root-associated microbiomes, the framework could also be applied to other microbiomes. This may help improve understanding and management of microbial systems that play important roles in human health and other areas.