Soil–plant–microbe interactions in the rhizosphere: incremental amplification induced by localized fertilization

Highlights

● Plants can respond to heterogeneously distributed nutrient resources by enhancing root foraging capacity.

● Incremental amplification of root foraging for nutrients induced by localized fertilization was proposed.

● Incremental effects from the roots/rhizosphere to the plant-soil system conserve resources and reduce the environmental footprint of agricultural production.

Abstract

Localized fertilization strategies (banding fertilizers) developed to minimize nutrient fixation by soil are used widely in intensive agricultural production. Localized fertilization encourages root foraging for heterogeneously distributed soil nutrients. This review focuses on the advances in root growth and nutrient acquisition of heterogeneously distributed soil resources. It is proposed that the incremental amplification of root foraging for nutrients induced by localized fertilization: (1) increased absorption area due to altered root morphology, (2) enhanced mobilization capacity underpinned by enhanced root physiological processes, and (3) intensified belowground interactions due to selective stimulation of soil microorganisms. The increase in root proliferation and the nutrient mobilization capacity as well as microbiome changes caused by localized fertilization can be amplified stepwise to synergistically enhance root foraging capacity, nutrient use efficiency and improve crop productivity. Engineering the roots/rhizosphere through localized, tailored nutrient application to stimulate nature-based root foraging for heterogeneously distributed soil nutrients, and scaling up of the root foraging capacity and nutrient acquisition efficiency from the rhizosphere to the field offers a potential pathway for green and sustainable intensification of agriculture.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

Incremental amplification / localized fertilization / root/rhizosphere engineering / high nutrient-use efficiency

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Acknowledgements

This work was financially supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2023YFD1901500/2023YFD1901503), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (32302669, 32202594, 32130094), the Natural Science Foundation of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of China (2023QN03002, 2024MS03004), the High-Level/Excellent Doctoral Talent Research Initiation Project of Inner Mongolia Agricultural University (NDYB2021-5, NDYB2022-20), and the Inner Mongolia Agricultural University Basic Research Project (BR22-13-04).

Compliance with ethics guidelines

Liyang Wang, Dan Liao, Zed Rengel, and Jianbo Shen declare that they have no financial or other conflicts of interest to disclose. This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects.

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

The Author(s) 2024. Published by Higher Education Press. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0)