Composition and activity of endophytic bacterial communities in field-grown maize plants inoculated with Azospirillum brasilense

Table 1 A statistical analysis and description of the 16S rRNA gene clone libraries from the stem core samples of field-grown maize (AG 2040 hybrid) inoculated with Azospirillum brasilense Ab-V5

Library^a	Nucleic acid^b	Fertilization condition	Sequences	OTUs^c	Homogeneous coverage (%)^d	Species richness	Shannon–Weaver index
EEM30N	DNA	LN	85	33	71.7	46.0	2.89
EEM160N	DNA	RN	80	31	73.8	42.0	2.89
RTEEM30N	RNA	LN	42	16	73.8	21.7	2.27
RTEEM160N	RNA	RN	38	6	97.4	6.2	1.48
EEM30N + EEM160N	DNA	LN + RN	165	61	63.0	96.8	3.59
RTEEM30N + RTEEM160N	RNA	LN + RN	80	18	77.5	23.2	2.17
EEM30N + RTEEM30N	DNA + RNA	LN	127	46	75.6	60.8	3.27
EEM160N + RTEEM160N	DNA + RNA	RN	118	37	82.2	45.0	3.13

RN, Regular nitrogen (N)-fertilization treatment; LN, low N-fertilization treatment; OTU, operational taxonomic unit
^aSee text (section 16S libraries: cloning and sequencing) and caption to Fig. 1 for a definition of the libraries
^bThe nucleic acid extract used to construct the respective clone library
^cOTUs were defined at 97 % sequence identity
^d C _x = 1 – (n _x /N), where n _x is the number of OTUs represented by a single clone sequence in a library and N is the total number of clones

ISSN: 1869-2044