Decoding Potential Co-Relation Between Endosphere Microbiome Community Composition and Mycotoxin Production in Forage Grasses

Cultivated pasture grasses contribute forage to more than 40% of cattle produced in 11 southern states in the USA. In recent years the increasing intoxication of cattle feeding on pasture grasses raised serious concerns about their palatability. While molecular and metagenomics techniques have revealed the great diversity of microbial composition and functional richness of the grass endosphere microbiome, meta-sequencing techniques enable us to gain a bird’s-eye view of all plant-associated microbiomes as a ‘holobiont’. Plant holobionts provide a more comprehensive approach where one can define the functions of microbial communities and feedback between the core and satellite microbiomes of a targeted host. In the near future we will be able to tailor our grasses and their endosphere microbiomes through the host-directed selection of a ‘modular microbiome’, leading to ‘plant enhanced holobionts’ as a microbiome-driven solution to managing the intoxication of pasture grasses in livestock. The present review aims to understand the potential co-relation between the endosphere microbiome community composition and mycotoxin production in forage grasses in the southern United States.