Prevalence of Betaproteobacterial Sequences in <Emphasis Type="Italic">nifH</Emphasis> Gene Pools Associated with Roots of Modern Rice Cultivars

The diversity and function of nitrogen-fixing bacteria colonizing rice roots are not well understood. A field experiment was conducted to determine the diversity of diazotrophic communities associated with roots of modern rice cultivars using culture-independent molecular analyses of nitrogenase gene (nifH) fragments. Experimental treatments included four modern rice cultivars (Oryza sativa, one Indica, one Japonica and two hybrid rice varieties) and three levels (0, 50, and 100 kg N ha⁻¹) of N (urea) fertilizer application. Cloning and sequencing of 103 partial nifH genes showed that a diverse community of diazotrophs was associated with rice roots. However, the nifH gene fragments belonging to betaproteobacteria were dominant, accounting for nearly half of nifH sequences analyzed across the clone libraries. Most of them were similar to nifH fragments retrieved from wild rice and Kallar grass, with Azoarcus spp. being the closest cultured relatives. Alphaproteobacteria were also detected, but their relative abundance in the nifH gene pools was dramatically decreased with N fertilizer application. In addition, a high fraction of nifH gene pools was affiliated with methylotrophs and methane oxidizers. The sequence analysis was consistent with the terminal restriction fragment-length polymorphism (T-RFLP) fingerprinting of the nifH gene fragments, which showed three of four dominant terminal restriction fragments were mainly related to betaproteobacteria based on in silico digestion of nifH sequences. T-RFLP analyses also revealed that the effects of N fertilizer on the nifH gene diversity retrieved from roots varied according to rice cultivars. In summary, the present study revealed the prevalence of betaproteobacterial sequences among the proteobacteria associated with roots of modern rice cultivars. This group of diazotrophs appeared less sensitive to N fertilizer application than diazotrophic alphaproteobacteria. Furthermore, methylotrophs may also play a role in nitrogen fixation on rice roots. However, it must be noted that due to the potential bias of polymerase chain reaction protocol, the significance of non-proteobacterial diazotrophs such as Firmicutes and anaerobic bacteria is possibly underestimated.