Co-occurrence networks reveal more complexity than community composition in resistance and resilience of microbial communities

Plant response to drought stress involves fungi and bacteria that live on and in plants and in the rhizosphere, yet the stability of these myco- and micro-biomes remains poorly understood. We investigate the resistance and resilience of fungi and bacteria to drought in an agricultural system using both community composition and microbial associations. Here we show that tests of the fundamental hypotheses that fungi, as compared to bacteria, are (i) more resistant to drought stress but (ii) less resilient when rewetting relieves the stress, found robust support at the level of community composition. Results were more complex using all-correlations and co-occurrence networks. In general, drought disrupts…

• UD
  U.S. Department of Energy

  Awards: -AC02-05CH11231, 05CH11231, DE-FOA-0001207, AC02-05CH11231, DE-AC02, DE-AC02-05CH11231, DE-SC0014081, DE-AC02-
• JG
  Joint Genome Institute

  Awards: DE-AC02-05CH11231, AC02-05CH11231
• NN
  National Natural Science Foundation of China

  Awards: 32170129, DE-AC02-05CH11231
• CA
  Chinese Academy of Sciences
• SK
  State Key Laboratory of Mycology

  Award: SKLMZD202101
• OO
  Office of Science

  Awards: AC02-05CH11231, -AC02-05CH11231, DE-AC02