Local co-adaptation of plants and their microbiota to climatic stress

• Applicants: Professor Dr. Eric Kemen; Dr. Karin Schrieber
• Subject Area: Organismic Interactions, Chemical Ecology and Microbiomes of Plant Systems ; Ecology and Biodiversity of Plants and Ecosystems
• Term: since 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 515385982

Climate change magnifies heat and drought stress for numerous wild plant species, thereby increasing their susceptibility to biotic stress. How species respond to such change on contemporary and evolutionary time scales dictates the degree to which their future distribution ranges may retract with fatal consequences for biodiversity and ecosystem functioning. There is evidence that plant-associated microbiota contribute to abiotic and biotic stress resistance, as well as evolutionary stress adaptations in their hosts. In this sub-project of the Research Unit (RU) PlantsCoChallenge, we will study local stress adaptation at the level of the metaorganism (the plant host with its associated microbiota), instead of viewing plant populations as isolated selective units. Using Cakile maritima with its specific microbiome as a study system, we will investigate adaptive trait divergence in the metaorganisms’ climatic stress resistance (heat, drought) across a latitudinal scale (Northern versus Southern Europe). We will use a holistic approach comprising a field study to characterize systematic latitudinal variation of the metaorganism and its natural abiotic environment (WP1); a greenhouse experiment testing for adaptive latitudinal divergence of the metaorganisms climatic stress responses (WP2); and a reciprocal transplant experiment testing for crossing reaction norms in plant fitness under co-consideration of associated microbiota (WP3). Our sub-project will be tightly interlinked in the RU program enabling the integrative analyses of plant traits closely associated with fitness, the plant genome, metabolome, and microbiome. This approach will allow us to quantify the relative contribution of stochastic and selective evolutionary forces to latitudinal population divergence, and to potentially identify local climates as major selective force. Our long-term goal is gaining mechanistic insight into the consequences of altered stress regimes for resource exchange in plant-microbe interactions and species co-evolution in the face of rapid environmental change.

• DFG Programme: Research Units
• Subproject of: FOR 5640: Physiological and Evolutionary Adaptation of Plants to Co-occurring Abiotic and Biotic Challenges
• Co-Investigator: Professorin Dr. Alexandra Erfmeier