Acacia hindsii phyllosphere bacteria
The goal of this study was to compare the epiphytic bacterial community on Acacia hindsii leaves in presence and absence of mutualistic or non-mutualistic ant partners by 454 pyrosequencing of the 16S rRNA gene.    Three leaves coming from eight different plants of A. hindsii in presence and in absence of symbiotic and parasitic ants were collected and used for DNA extraction and subsequent bacterial tag-encoded FLX pyrosequencing of 16S amplicons (bTEFAP). Three to four replicates for each treatment were collected and sequenced. DNA samples were sent to an external service provider (Research & Testing Laboratories, Lubbock, USA) for bTEFAP with 16S rRNA primers Gray28F and Gray519R (Ishak et al. 2011; Sun, Wolcott & Dowd 2011). A sequencing library was generated through one-step PCR with 30 cycles, using a mixture of HotStar and HotStar HiFidelity Taq polymerases (Qiagen). Sequencing extended from Gray28F, using a Roche 454 FLX instrument with Titanium reagents and procedures at Research and Testing Laboratory (RTL, Lubbock, TX, USA, http://www.medicalbiofilm.org/). All low quality reads (quality cut-off = 25) and sequences < 200 bp were removed following sequencing, which left 264,539 sequences for analysis (mean ± SD = 20,266 ± 5735 per sample).  Sample CG3 (BioSample accession SAMN02302533) is the third replicate of Acacia hindsii leaves with the parasitic ant present.