Sarah L. Lebeis

TL;DR: The pyrosequencing of the bacterial 16S ribosomal RNA gene of more than 600 Arabidopsis thaliana plants is reported to test the hypotheses that the root rhizosphere and endophytic compartment microbiota of plants grown under controlled conditions in natural soils are sufficiently dependent on the host to remain consistent across different soil types and developmental stages.

TL;DR: It is established that biosynthesis of, and signaling dependent on, the foliar defense phytohormone salicylic acid is required to assemble a normal root microbiome, and selection from the available microbial communities to sculpt the root microbiome.

TL;DR: It is shown that there is no overlap of abundant bacterial taxa between the microbiotas of the mammalian gut and plant roots, whereas taxa overlap does exist between fish Gut and plant root communities.

TL;DR: This work sequenced 484 genomes of bacterial isolates from roots of Brassicaceae, poplar, and maize and validated candidates from two sets of plant-associated genes, including one involved in plant colonization and the other serving in microbe–microbe competition between plant and microbe.

TL;DR: It is shown that cell-associated enveloped virions (CEV) use Abl- and Src-family tyrosine kinases for actin motility, and that these kinases act in a redundant fashion, perhaps permitting motility in a greater range of cell types.