“Unraveling the Power of Protist-Bacterial Partnerships: Novel Auxin Dynamics in the Rhizosphere” Monday, April 14, 1:00 PM, Carl Hansen Student Center SC 119

 Quinnipiac Chapter of Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Honor Society

Seminar Series presents

Dr. Ravikumar Patel, Agricultural Post-Doctoral Research Scientist at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station

“Unraveling the Power of Protist-Bacterial Partnerships: Novel Auxin Dynamics in the Rhizosphere”

Monday, April 14, 1:00 PM, Carl Hansen Student Center SC 119

Protists play a crucial role in shaping rhizosphere microbial communities, often forming symbiotic associations with bacteria enriched for plant-beneficial traits. Using metagenomic sequencing, we identified 61 unique bacterial genomes from maize rhizosphere protists, 70% of which contained phytohormone synthesis genes. We validated the gene annotation predictions by lab testing and found that auxin is the most prevalent trait.  We next asked if protists would respond to exogenously supplemented auxin. Auxin supplementation significantly enhanced protist growth, prompting transcriptomic analysis in Colpoda, which revealed over 1,700 differentially expressed genes linked to auxin signaling and cell cycle regulation. Our findings reveal a diverse array of heterotrophic rhizosphere protists associated with auxin-producing bacteria, exhibiting auxin-dependent growth phenotypes and gene expression. This is the first evidence of auxin-dependent growth in heterotrophic single eukaryotes. These findings highlight auxin's pivotal role in mediating tripartite interactions among plants, bacteria, and protists in the rhizosphere.

Dr. Ravikumar Patel is a postdoctoral research scientist at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, New Haven, CT, where he devotes his expertise to unraveling the complex interactions between single-cell eukaryotes, bacteria, and plants. With over a decade of research experience in microbiology, molecular biology, plant biology, and analytical chemistry, Dr. Patel specializes in the investigation of plant-associated microbes. His postgraduate work includes the identification of the mechanism of interaction between rhizosphere protists and bacteria and the molecular basis of bacterial pathogen survival against different control treatments. Dr. Patel received his Ph.D. in Biotechnology from Sardar Patel University. Throughout his career, he has published extensively, contributed to multiple prestigious journals, and been recognized with various awards.