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Abstract
Soil predators are of central importance in regulating the interaction between plants, soil, and
microbiota via a top-down control of microbes, including plant pathogens, and increased
nutrient cycling. Infections by plant pathogens trigger defence, can alter the host metabolism
and nutrient flow into the soil, leading to changes which feed-back to the soil microbiome.
However, the links between soilborne pathogens, soil predators and the soil microbiome are
only starting to be explored. We used the clubroot pathogen Plasmodiophora brassicae - a
major obstacle for the cultivation of Brassica worldwide with no effective control options - to
investigate disease induced changes of the soil microbiome and the role of soil predators in
clubroot disease development. We aim to identify potentially disease suppressive and
disease conducive predators and microbiome members, including bacteria, fungi and protist
and other top-down controller. We combined soil physicochemical analyses with longamplicon sequencing to decipher underlying drivers of taxonomic and functional changes in
the microbiome to clubroot infections in field and greenhouse experiments. Additionally,
feeding behaviour of soil predators on clubroot spores was investgated. We present insights
of the potential of soil predators to control soilborne diseases such as clubroot that might
lead to new biocontrol applications for soilborne pathogens in the future.