M. Kersch-Becker

Phyllosphere bacterial communities in milkweeds: composition diverge as the season progresses, and links to cardenolides and arthropods depend on host identity

Leaf bacterial communities shape plant defense and interactions with herbivores, yet how host filtering and stochastic processes assemble them remains unclear. We predicted that host identity, chemistry, and arthropods structure them, and that stochastic and deterministic contributions shift seasonally. Across one grow...