Untangling the Pea Root Rot Complex Reveals Microbial Markers for Plant Health

Plant health is recognised as a key element to ensure global food security. While plant breeding has substantially improved crop resistance against individual pathogens, it showed limited success for diseases caused by the interaction of multiple pathogens such as root rot in pea (Pisum sativum L.). To untangle the causal agents of the pea root rot complex and determine the role of the plant genotype in shaping its own detrimental or beneficial microbiome, fungal and oomycete root rot pathogens, as well as previously identified beneficials, i.e., arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) and Clonostachys rosea, were qPCR quantified in diseased roots of eight differently resistant pea genotypes grown in four agricultural soils under controlled conditions. We found that soil and pea genotype significantly determined the microbial compositions in diseased pea roots. Despite significant genotype x soil interactions and distinct soil-dependent pathogen complexes, our data revealed key microbial taxa that were associated with plant fitness. Our study indicates the potential of fungal and oomycete markers for plant health and serves as a precedent for other complex plant pathosystems. Such microbial markers can be used to complement plant phenotype- and genotype-based selection strategies to improve disease resistance in one of the world’s most important pulse crops of the world.