| Summary: | <p>There is a growing body of literature demonstrating the role of microbial communities in
plant growth, health, and resilience. It is becoming increasingly clear that advances in our
understanding of plant-microbe interactions could make a significant difference in
sustainable agricultural production.</p>
<p>In my thesis, we approach this ever-evolving topic to try to advance our understanding of
plant-microbe interactions within the agricultural ecosystem. One key question that has
attracted recent research efforts is whether plant domestication has influenced hostmicrobiome assembly and composition.</p>
<p>In Chapter 2, we develop an evolutionary framework explaining that domesticated plants
could showcase a reduction in positive microbe-to-host effects as a result of plant
phenotypic traits selected by the domesticator through artificial selection. In Chapter 3,
we provide evidence of the effect of domesticated plant traits on seed microbiome
composition and assembly, partially validating the framework developed in Chapter 2. In
Chapter 4, we approach the plant and its microbiome from a broader perspective and
reflect on the consequences of plant domestication from a community evolution point of
view. In Chapter 5, we develop a tool that will allow researchers to study bacterial plant
colonization and how bacteria could eventually be transmitted to the seed compartment.
Overall, we show that domesticated plant traits have consistent effects on seed
microbiome composition and assembly, independently of the domestication event. We
also demonstrate that monitoring bacterial localization in plants can be effectively
achieved by combining bacterial bioluminescence with fluorescence.</p>
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