description
- This project, The UK Crop Microbiome Cryobank (UKCMCB) will establish a total resource of microorganisms and information associated with the microbiome of the UKs major crops. It brings together four leading institutions: Rothamsted Research, CABI, the James Hutton Institute and the John Innes Centre (in association with UEA). Each has a proven track record of working with industry, working at the forefront of pure and applied Agritech research. The plant microbiome mainly consists of fungi, bacteria and viruses that are associated with a plant and includes microbes that can be isolated and cultured and those that currently are currently not amenable to culture. Microbial consortia include members that help the plant host by providing nutrients, help prevent disease or allow a plant to tolerate environmental conditions. Driven by academic research and Agritech industry needs, it will provide a resource to underpin research on the Crop Microbiome, delivering sustainable solutions to improve plant health and crop productivity. The resource will facilitate better understanding of microbial community interactions, including the host plant and other components of the 'Phytobiome', and thereby impact plant health, from improvements in rhizosphere health through to control of biological threats. The resource will comprise: -A publicly available integrated Cryobank collection of samples (rhizoplane material -soils, bacterial and fungal isolates, plant material, and DNA) taken initially from 315 samples from systems significant to the UK Agritech sector. Initial focus will be on 6 crops (barley, oats, oil seed rape, potato, sugar beet and wheat ) from 9 different soil sites from across the UK. This will be supplemented with culturable material from the samples. Samples will be optimally preserved at ultra-low temperature using state-of-the-art technologies. -A curated AgMicrobiome Base of sample information with annotated sequences and meta-data for end-users. This will be the first synchronised resource covering the total microbiome of a variety of crops in identical soil types, supported by a bioinformatics resource, microbiologists, plant and crop health experts, with world class storage facilities. Provision of material will allow research into unexplored cultural biodiversity. - A further work package will be focussed on demonstrating the utility of the UK-CMCB for isolation of plant growth promoting bacteria and synthetic community construction. This will involve characterisation of the culturable microbiota associated with UK crop plants and the generation of crop-associated synthetic microbial communities (SynComs) and testing for positive plant growth traits. The microbes generated through this work package will be added to the CryoBank and made available to the public. The plant culture and microbial isolation work will take place at Rothamsted Research, biological resources will be held and curated in association with national collections at CABI, while JHI & Rothamsted will manage generation of functional data for the sequence resource. JIC in association with UEA will undertake the work on synthetic community construction. Samples will undergo microbial community profiling, and all microbial isolates will undergo phylogenetic characterisation and a subset of these will undergo full genome sequencing. All meta genomes and genomes will be deposited in a freely accessible database resource after sequence annotation, and provide a microbial genome resource for the research community This will result in the creation of a unique, world-leading combined resource of microbiome material, microorganisms, DNA and associated data useful for both academic and commercial research with potential for deployment in sustainable Agriculture