Table 2.

Studies on the microbial diversity in the phyllosphere using culture-independent approaches

Aims of investigations	Objects	Methods	Results	References
Bacterial and fungal epi- and endophytic phyllosphere communities affected by long-term summer drought	Leaves of Quercus ilex	T-RFLP analysis	Richness and diversity decreased on the surface and in the interior of leaves in summer. Drought promoted TRF richness, especially that of epiphytic microorganisms	Peňuelas et al. (2012)
Endophytic bacterial communities influenced by plant species, season and location	Leaves of common plant species of a tallgrass prairie	T-RFLP analysis	Distribution of endophytic bacteria was mostly related to host species followed by sampling dates and location.	Ding et al. (2013)
Annual and seasonal variations in bacterial community structure	Leaves of a single tree of Magnolia grandiflora	DGGE and sequencing of 16S rRNA gene clone libraries	Distinct seasonal patterns of bacterial communities were not predictable from year to year.	Jackson & Denney (2011)
Diversity of phyllopheric bacteria and its relationship with airborne bacteria	Leaves of several Mediterranial perennial and herbaceous evergreen plants	DGGE and sequencing of 16S rRNA gene clone libraries	Bacteria on leaves were not related to bacteria in the air. Plant species had strong influence on the composi tion of bacterial community	Vokou et al. (2012)
Quantification of the spatial variability in fungal assemblages	European beech (Fagus sylvatica) in different spatial scales (tree, branch, group of leaves, individual leaf)	Capillary electrophoresis–SSCP and pyrosequencing of ITS amplicons	Variability was highest between indi vidual leaves. Dissimilarity between fungal assemblages correlated rather with genetic distance than with geographic distance between trees.	Cordier et al. (2012)
Composition of bacterial populations influenced by tree species and geographic locations	Leaves of 56 tree species, needles of Pinus ponderosa in various locations of the world	Pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA gene amplicons	Bacterial diversity was greater across than within species. Little influence of geographic differences across continents. Patterns of bacterial communities' structures were predictable from the relateness of the trees.	Redford et al. (2010)
Composition of bacterial populations across an ele vational gradient	Leaves of Weinmannia trees in the eastern Andes of Peru	Pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA gene amplicons	Unlike plants and animals, bacteria did not exhibit an elevational gradient in their diversity.	Fierer et al. (2011)
Composition and diversity of bacterial communities	Leaves of six tropical tree species common in rainforests of the Malay Peninsula	Pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA gene amplicons	Tropical trees had a distinctive bacte rial phyllosphere community, which was not greatly different from that of temperate or subtropical trees.	Kim et al. (2012)
Comparison of epiphytic and endophytic bacterial communities	Leaves of Arabidopsis thaliana	Pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA gene amplicons	Richness was lower in epiphytic than in endophytic samples. Gamma- proteobacteria (Pseudomonas) were dominant in the epiphytic community.	Bodenhausen et al. (2013)
Composition of the bacterial phyllosphere community depending on geographical distances	Leaves of Tamarix aphylla trees along a 500 km tran sect with uniform environmental conditions across the Soronan desert	Pyrosequencing targe ting V4–V6 regions of 16S rRNA genes	Community similarity declinedsigni ficantly with geographic distance, the most important parameter that affects the community composition under similar environmental conditions.	Finkel et al. (2012)
Composition of the microbial phyllosphere community depending on the geographic location	Leaves of different Tamarix tree species in Medite rennian and Dead Sea hypervariable regions and two locations in the USA	Pyrosequencing of 16S/18S rRNA gene amplicons	Microbial communities on different Tamarix species were highly similar in the same location, whereas trees of the same species growing in different climatic regions hosted dis tinct microbial communities.	Finkel et al. (2011)
Seasonal dynamics of the composition of fungal populations	Leaves of Quercus macrocarpa in urban and nonurban environ ments	Pyrosequencing of ITS2 amplicons	Fungal communities were lower in diversity and richness on urban trees. Seasonal patterns of fungal communities were predictable.	Jumpponen & Jones (2010)
Spatiotemporal variations in bacterial community composition	Field-grown Romaine lettuce	qPCR of total bacterial population, pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA gene amplicons	Variability in bacterial communities' composition on plant leaves was determined by season, field location and environmental conditions.	Rastogi et al. (2012)
Analysis of the bacterial community and comparison with those of previously analysed plant species	Aerial parts of rice (Oryza sativa)	DGGE and sequencing of 16S rRNA gene clone libraries, whole metagenome shot gun sequencing	Dominance of Alphaproteobacteria (Rhizobium and Methylobacterium) and Actinobacteria (Microbacterium). The complexity of this community was comparable with those of other plants.	Knief et al. (2012)