FIG 3 .

Spatially associated plants share similar taxon abundances. (A) Principal coordinates plot using the abundance-based Morisita-Horn index to measure beta diversity, based on OTUs clustered at 97% similarity. Blue, air; green, tray 1 plants; orange, tray 2 plants. Scaling is the same as described for Fig. 1. Arrows indicate trajectories from newly colonized plants to tray-specific communities. (B) Abundance trajectory of the dominant tray 1 biomarker Pseudomonas; error bars indicate the standard deviation of replicate plants. Green bars indicate relative abundance of the OTU in tray 1, orange bars in tray 2, and blue bars in air. (C, D) Abundance profiles for major tray marker taxa identified by LEfSe at successive time points. (C) Abundance of the tray 1 biomarker Rhodococcus. (D) Abundance of the tray 2 biomarker Methylobacterium. (E) Abundance of the dominant tray 2 biomarker Acinetobacter. Note that three plants were sampled at every time point, chosen randomly; possible configurations for sampling between trays 1 and 2 were (2,1), (1,2), (3,0), or (0,3).