Impacts of Charcoal Rot (Macrophomina phaseolina) Epidemiology on Drought Resistant Soybean Cellular Metabolism and Accompanying Tissue Microbiome for Identifying Alternative Breeding Targets Under Increasing Environmental Stress
Investigators
Objectives
We propose to use culture-independent metabarcoding and metabolomic analyses during year 1 (completed), 2 and 3, culture-dependent methods in year 2 to identify and isolate endophytes that specialized in disease tolerant plant varieties. Specific objectives of this project for year 2-3 are the following:
- To conduct Microbial whole community analysis of fungal/bacterial endophytes in drought tolerant and susceptible varieties infected with M. phaseolina in two greenhouse trials (normal watering in Trial 3 and drought stressed in Trial 4).
- To conduct Plant tissue subsamples collected from variety treatments in (1), an untargeted and targeted metabolomic analysis using NMR will be conducted emphasizing oxidative stress and energy producing metabolites.
- Through strong statistical inference and experimentation, the holistic data will be analyzed to elucidate and three-party interactions among endophytic microbes, the fungal pathogen, and the host plant metabolism using greenhouse investigations (year 2) to inform yield improvements.
Expected End Results
Using a new approach to understand concurrent physiological, metabolic, and protective microbial changes in drought resistant and susceptible plants during the infection process by M. phaseolina has the potential to provide breeders with informed targets for the development of charcoal rot resistant soybean varieties or other protective agronomic approaches. To date much effort and expense has been invested in screening for resistance to M. phaseolina in soybeans without the release of commercially successful cultivars. Results from this proposed research can provide alternative approaches in targets for developing resistance varieties in the future, which will greatly increase yields.