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Fungal-mediated soil legacies of halophytes enhance plant salt resilience
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DOI：10.1016/j.ejsobi.2026.103826.png)
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Abstract
En 中文
Soil salinization increasingly threatens global agriculture, yet critical knowledge gaps remain in understanding how halophytes shape soil legacies and regulate stress resilience in succeeding plants through microbially mediated pathways. We conducted a controlled soil-inoculation experiment using farmland background that was either autoclaved (sterilized) or left intact (non-sterilized), amended with soils collected from beneath six halophytes (grasses: Imperata cylindrica, Aeluropus littoralis, Phragmites australis; forbs: Suaeda glauca, Suaeda salsa, Limonium bicolor) as inocula at 10% (w/w; inoculum:background = 1:9). Seedlings of two succeeding plants (the halophyte S. salsa and the glycophyte Medicago sativa) were then grown under two salinity levels (0 vs 5 g/kg NaCl) to test how these soil legacies influence plant performance under salt stress. Soils collected under grass halophytes harbored significantly higher fungal richness than those collected under forb halophytes, with greater differentiation in fungal composition and more complex microbial network structures. Inoculation with halophyte-conditioned soils enhanced S. salsa biomass while showing no significant effects on M. sativa. Plants produced higher biomass in non-sterilized background soil than in sterilized soil under both non- and lowsalinity conditions. Within inoculated treatments, low salinity (5 g/kg NaCl) did not reduce S. salsa biomass but decreased M. sativa biomass, indicating greater salt sensitivity of the glycophyte in these soil contexts. In sterilized and low-salinity environments, fungal community composition in soils collected under grass halophytes showed significant correlations with M. sativa feedback indices. At the taxon level, several fungal OTUs detected in rhizosphere soils collected under grass halophytes (e.g., Pleosporales and Capnodiales) were also significantly associated with M. sativa feedback indices under specific soil contexts. Overall, our results suggest that halophyte soil legacies can improve succeeding plant growth and salt tolerance. These effects are contextdependent and statistically associated with host-specific microbiota across salinity levels. These findings highlight the potential for halophytes to help steer soil microbiomes to improve crop resilience in saline agroecosystems, while warranting further field-based validation.
Keywords:
Legacy effects
Saline-alkali soil
Halophytes
Microbial communities
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