Endophytic bacterial diversity in the phyllosphere of Amazon Paullinia cupana associated with asymptomatic and symptomatic anthracnose

• Published in: SpringerPlus Vol. 4; no. 1; p. 258
• Main Authors: Bogas, Andréa Cristina, Ferreira, Almir José, Araújo, Welington Luiz, Astolfi-Filho, Spartaco, Kitajima, Elliot Watanabe, Lacava, Paulo Teixeira, Azevedo, João Lúcio
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer International Publishing 13-06-2015; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Actinobacteria; Colletotrichum; Earth and Environmental Sciences; Firmicutes; Haemophilus; Humanities and Social Sciences; multidisciplinary; Neisseria; Paullinia cupana; Proteobacteria; Pseudomonas; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Endophytes; PCR-DGGE; Microbial diversity; Clone library; Culture dependent; Colletotrichum
• ISSN: 2193-1801; 2193-1801
• DOI: 10.1186/s40064-015-1037-0

Endophytes colonize an ecological niche similar to that of phytopathogens, which make them candidate for disease suppression. Anthracnose is a disease caused by
Colletotrichum
spp., a phytopathogen that can infect guarana (
Paullinia cupana
), an important commercial crop in the Brazilian Amazon. We investigated the diversity of endophytic bacteria inhabiting the phyllosphere of asymptomatic and symptomatic anthracnose guarana plants. The PCR-denaturation gradient gel electrophoresis (PCR-DGGE) fingerprints revealed differences in the structure of the evaluated communities. Detailed analysis of endophytic bacteria composition using culture-dependent and 16S rRNA clone libraries revealed the presence of
Firmicutes
,
Proteobacteria
,
Actinobacteria
,
Bacteroidetes
, and
Acidobacteria
phyla
. Firmicutes
comprised the majority of isolates in asymptomatic plants (2.40E
−4
). However, cloning and sequencing of 16S rRNA revealed differences at the genus level for
Neisseria
(1.4E
−4
),
Haemophilus
(2.1E
−3
) and
Arsenophonus
(3.6E
−5
) in asymptomatic plants,
Aquicella
(3.5E
−3
) in symptomatic anthracnose plants, and
Pseudomonas
(1.1E
−3
), which was mainly identified in asymptomatic plants. In cross-comparisons of the endophytic bacterial communities as a whole, symptomatic anthracnose plants contained higher diversity, as reflected in the Shannon–Weaver and Simpson indices estimation (
P
 < 0.05). Similarly, comparisons using LIBSHUFF and heatmap analysis for the relative abundance of operational taxonomic units (OTUs) showed differences between endophytic bacterial communities. These data are in agreement with the NMSD and ANOSIM analysis of DGGE profiles. Our results suggest that anthracnose can restructure endophytic bacterial communities by selecting certain strains in the phyllosphere of
P. cupana
. The understanding of these interactions is important for the development of strategies of biocontrol for
Colletotrichum
.