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This work was carried out in collaboration between all authors. Author GNP designed and evaluated the competitive ability in co inoculated plants and made the statistical analysis. Author LV works in the identification of organisms in the soil, designed and performed the study. Authors IM and JS design and performed the experiments aimed at analysing infection foci in inoculated plants and measured nodulation on a subset of these plants. Author VMA performed the evolution of nodulation efficiency by inoculating different cell concentrations. Author PAB collaborated in the design of the experiments, the statistical analysis of the results and wrote the paper. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

A pair of primers homologous to the nolXWBTUV locus generated a 260 bp fragment by PCR only in the presence of Sinorhizobium fredii template DNA of different quality. This resulted in a fast and accurate method for the identification of S. fredii either from pure DNA, whole bacterial cells or nodule extracts. By means of two PCR fragments, one specific for S. fredii (260-bp) and the other specific for Bradyrhizobium japonicum (RSalpha), we found that S. fredii strain SMH12 and B. japonicum E109 were equally efficient at developing nodules on soybean plants grown under controlled environmental conditions.

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