Microbial community composition is linked to Sphagnum acclimation to warming
crossref(2021)
Abstract
<p>Peatlands store about third of the terrestrial carbon (C) and exert long-term climate cooling. Dominant plant genera in acidic peatlands, <em>Sphagnum</em> mosses, are main contributors to net primary productivity. Through associative relationships with diverse microbial organisms (microbiome), <em>Sphagnum</em> mosses control major biogeochemical processes, namely uptake, storage and potential release of carbon and nitrogen. Climate warming is expected to negatively impact C accumulation in peatlands and alter nutrient cycling, however <em>Sphagnum</em>-dominated peatland resilience to climate warming may depend on <em>Sphagnum</em>-microbiome associations. The ability of the microbiome to rapidly acclimatize to warming may aid <em>Sphagnum</em> exposed to elevated temperatures through host-microbiome acquired thermotolerance. We investigated the role of the microbiome on <em>Sphagnum</em>’s ability to acclimate to elevated temperatures using a microbiome-transfer approach to test: a) whether the thermal origin of the microbiome influences acclimation of <em>Sphagnum</em> growth and b) if microbial benefits to <em>Sphagnum</em> growth depend on donor <em>Sphagnum</em> species.</p><p>            Using a full-factorial design, microbiomes were separated from <em>Sphagnum</em> “donor” species from four different peatlands across a wide range of thermal environments (11.4-27°C). The microbiomes were transferred onto germ-free “recipient” <em>Sphagnum</em> species in the laboratory and exposed to a range of experimental temperatures (8.5 – 26.5°C) for growth analysis over 4 weeks.</p><p>            Normalized growth rates were maximized for plants that received a microbiome from a matched “donor” and with a similar origin temperature (ΔT<sub>treatment-origin</sub>: 0.3±0.9°C [±standard error], p = 0.73). For non-matched “donor-recipient” <em>Sphagnum</em> pairs, ΔT<sub>treatment-origin</sub> was slightly negative with -4.1±2.1°C (p = 0.06). The largest growth rate of the “recipient” was measured when grown with a microbiome from a matching “donor” <em>Sphagnum</em> species and was 252% and 48% larger than the maximum growth rate of the germ-free <em>Sphagnum</em> and the non-matched “donor-recipient” <em>Sphagnum</em> pairs, respectively.</p><p>            Our results suggest that the composition of the <em>Sphagnum</em> microbiome plays a critical role in host plant temperature acclimation. We found that microbially-provided benefits to the host plant were most pronounced when: 1) the thermal origin of the microbiome is similar to experimental temperatures, and 2) when donor and recipient <em>Sphagnum</em> species are the same. Together, these results suggest that <em>Sphagnum</em> temperature acclimation can be modulated, in part, by microbial interactions and may potentially play a role in peatland resilience to climate warming.</p>
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