David Clara (Innsbruck University)
Soybean seeds (left) and their associated microbial community (up: shown as bacterial colonies) form a biological unit. Do bacteria naturally occurring in inner seed structures play a role in successful germination (right: germinated soybean seeds)? Graph: David Clara
David Clara's Master thesis was awarded with the Prize for the Best Plant Science Master Thesis, which was carried out at Innsbruck University in the year 2021
Title: "Do natural seed bacterial microbiota play a role in soybean germination?"
In contrast to previous studies, we isolated naturally occurring bacterial seed endophytes and investigated their role during germination.
Seeds are known to interact dynamically with their associated microorganisms (i.e., the seed microbiota), which include endophytes (i.e., microorganisms spending at least part of their lifetime in inner seed structures). How they contribute to germination is unclear. We isolated a high number of bacterial colonies from soybean cotyledons and embryonic axes of different cultivars during germination, which were then characterised molecularly. Furthermore, we modified the seed microbiota and analysed the effects on seed germination. The molecular characterisation revealed a high bacterial endophyte diversity and differences between seed compartments and cultivars. A reduction of the microbial load had no effect on seed germination under sterile suboptimal conditions. Selective modifications of the seed microbiota led partly to germination promotion under a selected suboptimal condition, indicating the potential of a certain fraction of the microbiota. A detailed understanding of the dynamics between seeds and its microbiota during germination is crucial as the seed offers the possibility to design plant embryos that start life with an optimised microbiota.
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Read whole thesis at Innsbruck University: https://diglib.uibk.ac.at/ulbtirolhs/download/pdf/6554723?originalFilename=true
David Clara conducted this work at the Department of Botany in the research group of Univ.-Prof. Dr. Ilse Kranner under supervision of assoz. Prof. Thomas Roach and Dr. Davide Gerna.