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Peer-reviewedCC BY 4.0Plant, Cell & Environment

Beneath the Drought: Rhizosphere Processes Shape Genotype‐Specific Sorghum Responses to Drought‐Induced N Limitation

  • Rosepiah Munene1,2
  • Osman Mustafa1,2,3,4
  • Sara Loftus1
  • Vincent O. Suba5,6
  • Nipuna Withanage1,2
  • Niklas Schmücker7,8
  • Peter Bulli9
  • Reimund P. Rötter10,11
  • Dennis O. Otieno1,12,13
  • Mutez A. Ahmed13,14
  • Michaela A. Dippold1,10,13
14 affiliations
  1. 1Geo‐Biosphere Interactions, Department of Geosciences University of Tuebingen Tuebingen Germany
  2. 2Biogeochemistry of Agroecosystems, Department of Crop Sciences University of Goettingen Goettingen Germany
  3. 3Institute of Bio‐ and Geosciences IBG‐3: Agrosphere Juelich Research Centre Juelich Germany
  4. 4Department of Botany and Agricultural Biotechnology, Faculty of Agriculture University of Khartoum Khartoum North Sudan
  5. 5Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Applied Botany, South China Botanical Gardens Chinese Academy of Sciences Guangzhou China
  6. 6National Ecological Science Data Centre Guangdong Branch, South China Botanical Garden Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences Guangzhou China
  7. 7School of Agricultural, Forest and Food Science (HAFL) Bern University of Applied Sciences (BFH) Zollikofen Switzerland
  8. 8ETH Zürich, Department of Environmental Systems Science Zürich Switzerland
  9. 9Department of Plant, Animal and Food Sciences Jaramogi Oginga Odinga University of Science and Technology Bondo Kenya
  10. 10Tropical Plant Production and Agricultural Systems Modelling (TROPAGS) University of Goettingen Goettingen Germany
  11. 11Centre for Biodiversity and Sustainable Land Use (CBL) University of Goettingen Goettingen Germany
  12. 12Department of Biological Sciences Jaramogi Oginga Odinga University of Science and Technology Bondo Kenya
  13. 13Cluster of Excellence (EXC 3121): TERRA – Terrestrial Geo‐Biosphere Interactions in a Changing World University of Tübingen Germany
  14. 14Root‐Soil Interaction, School of Life Sciences Technical University of Munich Freising Germany
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Abstract

Droughts increasingly threaten crop productivity in nutrient‐depleted tropical soils. We investigated how water limitation influences rhizomicrobial traits (microbial biomass and functional community composition, enzyme activities) and nitrogen (N) uptake in three sorghum genotypes Makueni local (Mkl), Gadam (Gd), and IESH 22012 (IESH) under well‐watered and drought conditions. Depth‐specific (0–30 and 30–60 cm) 15N labelling traced N uptake at flowering and grain‐filling. Drought reduced grain N content across all genotypes but shoot N only in IESH. Gd enhanced 15N recovery in grains via post‐anthesis uptake from both depths under drought, whereas Mkl and IESH rather reallocated N within the plants towards the grain. Compared to well‐watered conditions, rhizosphere chitinase activity declined in Mkl under drought, while leucine aminopeptidase (LAP) activity remained unchanged. Under drought, microbial biomass decreased at flowering but recovered at grain‐filling, coinciding with enhanced arbuscular mycorrhiza fungi (AMF) colonisation. At grain‐filling, AMF associations with specific bacterial taxa aligned with grain N recovery, N‐utilisation efficiency, and LAP activity, displaying complementary roles within the plant‐AMF‐bacterial functional consortia in sustaining N acquisition. Overall, N acquisition in sorghum shifted in a genotype‐specific manner from reliance on microbial activity under well‐watered conditions to selective AMF‐bacterial partnership at grain‐filling under drought. These responses highlight the significant role of rhizosphere functional dynamics in sorghum N nutrition during reproductive stages under concomitant drought and nutrient limitation.

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Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@article{munene2026beneath,
  title = {{Beneath the Drought: Rhizosphere Processes Shape Genotype‐Specific Sorghum Responses to Drought‐Induced N Limitation}},
  author = {Rosepiah Munene and Osman Mustafa and Sara Loftus and Vincent O. Suba and Nipuna Withanage and Niklas Schmücker and Peter Bulli and Reimund P. Rötter and Dennis O. Otieno and Mutez A. Ahmed and Michaela A. Dippold},
  journal = {Plant, Cell \& Environment},
  year = {2026},
  month = aug,
  doi = {10.1111/pce.70845},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1111/pce.70845},
  note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY  - JOUR
TI  - Beneath the Drought: Rhizosphere Processes Shape Genotype‐Specific Sorghum Responses to Drought‐Induced N Limitation
AU  - Rosepiah Munene
AU  - Osman Mustafa
AU  - Sara Loftus
AU  - Vincent O. Suba
AU  - Nipuna Withanage
AU  - Niklas Schmücker
AU  - Peter Bulli
AU  - Reimund P. Rötter
AU  - Dennis O. Otieno
AU  - Mutez A. Ahmed
AU  - Michaela A. Dippold
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/08/31
JO  - Plant, Cell & Environment
DO  - 10.1111/pce.70845
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1111/pce.70845
AB  - Droughts increasingly threaten crop productivity in nutrient‐depleted tropical soils. We investigated how water limitation influences rhizomicrobial traits (microbial biomass and functional community composition, enzyme activities) and nitrogen (N) uptake in three sorghum genotypes Makueni local (Mkl), Gadam (Gd), and IESH 22012 (IESH) under well‐watered and drought conditions. Depth‐specific (0–30 and 30–60 cm) 15N labelling traced N uptake at flowering and grain‐filling. Drought reduced grain N content across all genotypes but shoot N only in IESH. Gd enhanced 15N recovery in grains via post‐anthesis uptake from both depths under drought, whereas Mkl and IESH rather reallocated N within the plants towards the grain. Compared to well‐watered conditions, rhizosphere chitinase activity declined in Mkl under drought, while leucine aminopeptidase (LAP) activity remained unchanged. Under drought, microbial biomass decreased at flowering but recovered at grain‐filling, coinciding with enhanced arbuscular mycorrhiza fungi (AMF) colonisation. At grain‐filling, AMF associations with specific bacterial taxa aligned with grain N recovery, N‐utilisation efficiency, and LAP activity, displaying complementary roles within the plant‐AMF‐bacterial functional consortia in sustaining N acquisition. Overall, N acquisition in sorghum shifted in a genotype‐specific manner from reliance on microbial activity under well‐watered conditions to selective AMF‐bacterial partnership at grain‐filling under drought. These responses highlight the significant role of rhizosphere functional dynamics in sorghum N nutrition during reproductive stages under concomitant drought and nutrient limitation.
SN  - 0140-7791
SN  - 1365-3040
ER  -