Phylogenetically diverse endophytic bacteria from desert plants induce transcriptional changes of tissue-specific ion transporters and salinity stress in Arabidopsis thaliana

Abdul Aziz Eida, Hanin S. Alzubaidy, Axel de Zélicourt, Lukas Synek, Wiam Alsharif, Feras Fawzi Lafi, Heribert Hirt, Maged Saad

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

33 Scopus citations

Abstract

Salinity severely hampers crop productivity worldwide and plant growth promoting bacteria could serve as a sustainable solution to improve plant growth under salt stress. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying salt stress tolerance promotion by beneficial bacteria remain unclear. In this work, six bacterial isolates from four different desert plant species were screened for their biochemical plant growth promoting traits and salinity stress tolerance promotion of the unknown host plant Arabidopsis thaliana. Five of the isolates induced variable root phenotypes but could all increase plant shoot and root weight under salinity stress. Inoculation of Arabidopsis with five isolates under salinity stress resulted in tissue-specific transcriptional changes of ion transporters and reduced Na+/K+ shoot ratios. The work provides first insights into the possible mechanisms and the commonality by which phylogenetically diverse bacteria from different desert plants induce salinity stress tolerance in Arabidopsis. The bacterial isolates provide new tools for studying abiotic stress tolerance mechanisms in plants and a promising agricultural solution for increasing crop yields in semi-arid regions.
Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)228-240
Number of pages13
JournalPlant Science
Volume280
DOIs
StatePublished - Dec 7 2018

Bibliographical note

KAUST Repository Item: Exported on 2020-10-01
Acknowledgements: The authors would like to thank Cristina Andrés-Barrao for useful discussions on bacterial classification and phylogenetic tree construction. We also thank all members of The Hirt Lab, CDA management team and the greenhouse and bioscience core labs in KAUST for their technical assistance. The work was funded by KAUST baseline research projects of H.H. The authors declare that the research was conducted in absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

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