The Action “Strategies for improving agronomic practices based on microbiomes (ROMANCE)” dives into the events happening belowground in cropping systems subjected to different agronomic practices, such as intercropping and crop rotations. These agrosystems have a plethora of microorganisms living in association with soils and plants, which are known as microbiome. The selection of proper agricultural practices is important to ensure the agrosystem health and influence microbiome shifts.
ROMANCE research questions address how the microbiome members, especially bacteria (bacteriome), interact with each component of the agrosystem, including plant-microbe, soil-microbe and microbe-microbe, and which bacteriomes have key roles in each analysed cropping system. The research approach established were directed to determine the core and the accessory bacterial microbiome with their commonly associated functions. Then, collected data allow the design of simplified native bacterial consortia based on the microbiota and/or functions that make agronomic systems work well versus the ones working worse. This knowledge allowed the design of bacterial consortia based on simplified native bacterial communities, which will improve crop fitness and productivity, as well as protect against quarantine pathogens. The final goal to help farmers selecting the best management practices for their conditions and the best bacterial consortium buffering most of their agrosystem limitations or deficiencies.
The overall objectives of ROMANCE are: i) to study the belowground bacteriome associated to intercropping and crop rotation systems, ii) to functionally characterize the bacteriome using a multi-omics approach (genomics, proteomics, metagenomics and culturomics) aand iii) to select and test simplified bacterial communities forming patentable consortia.
In summary, ROMANCE created a toolkit to aid in the selection of agro-practices and biofertilizers through a holistic vision of the belowground microbiomes, addressing the pros and cons of using microbiota profiling versus bacterial functionalities (bacteriomes) to design field-applicable products.
