Plant inoculation with endophytic bacteria that normally live inside the plant without harming the host is a highly promising approach for biological disease control. The mechanism of resistance induction by beneficial bacteria is poorly understood, because pathways are only partly known and systemic responses are typically not seen. The innate endophytic community structures change in response to external factors such as inoculation, and bacterial endophytes can exhibit direct or indirect antagonism towards pathogens. Earlier we showed that resistance induction by an endophytic Methylobacterium sp. in potato towards Pectobacterium atrosepticum was dependent on the density of the inoculum, whereas the bacterium itself had no antagonistic activity. To elucidate the role of innate endophyte communities in plant responses, we studied community changes in both in vitro and greenhouse experiments using various combinations of plants, endophyte inoculants, and pathogens. Induction of resistance was studied in several potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) cultivars by Methylobacterium sp. IMBG290 against the pathogens P. atrosepticum, Phytophthora infestans and Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato DC3000, and in pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) by M. extorquens DSM13060 against Gremmeniella abietina. The capacities of the inoculated endophytic Methylobacterium spp. strains to induce resistance were dependent on the plant cultivar, pathogen, and on the density of Methylobacterium spp. inoculum. Composition of the endophyte community changed in response to inoculation in shoot tissues and correlated with resistance or susceptibility to the disease. Our results demonstrate that endophytic Methylobacterium spp. strains have varying effects on plant disease resistance, which can be modulated through the endophyte community of the host.

Tissues of Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) contain several endophytic microorganisms of which Methylobacterium extorquens DSM13060 is a dominant species throughout the year. Similar to other endophytic bacteria, M. extorquens is able to colonize host plant tissues without causing any symptoms of disease. In addition to endophytic bacteria, plants associate simultaneously with a diverse set of microorganisms. Furthermore, plant-colonizing microorganisms interact with each other in a species- or strain-specific manner. Several studies on beneficial microorganisms interacting with plants have been carried out, but few deal with interactions between different symbiotic organisms and specifically, how these interactions affect the growth and development of the host plant. Our aim was to study how the pine endophyte M. extorquens DSM13060 affects pine seedlings and how the co-inoculation with ectomycorrhizal (ECM) fungi [Suillus variegatus (SV) or Pisolithus tinctorius (PT)] alters the response of Scots pine. We determined the growth, polyamine and nutrient contents of inoculated and non-inoculated Scots pine seedlings in vitro. Our results show that M. extorquens is able to improve the growth of seedlings at the same level as the ECM fungi SV and PT do. The effect of co-inoculation using different symbiotic organisms was seen in terms of changes in growth and nutrient uptake. Inoculation using M. extorquens together with ECM fungi improved the growth of the host plant even more than single ECM inoculation. Symbiotic organisms also had a strong effect on the potassium content of the seedling. The results indicate that interaction between endophyte and ECM fungus is species dependent, leading to increased or decreased nutrient content and growth of pine seedlings.