Heisenberg,
Over the past one or two months I have skimmed the entire thread and read almost all of your posts ("only" 67 pages with my settings). I am still left with questions, mainly because the thread is geared more towards the slime fighting attributes, and not other possible beneficial properties.
My understanding is throughout the thread you say bennies do not thrive in dwc and die off because they are not suited for life in water and do not multiply. The slime fighting process works because we deprive all life in the buckets of food by using synthetic nutes, and because of the thousands of different species of life, no one is able to dominate. Anerobic pathogens are unable to find food so they die off, and our bennies die off also and are replaced.
And yet, you also talk about providing housing and how colonies can establish in mature root systems in DWC over the course of 6 weeks or so. I am particularly interested in this, but it seems to be in contradiction with our bennies dying off and replacing them. I like your technique of putting an infected clone in a res with a healthy mother. The same thing is done in marine fish tanks with live rock; there are a lot of similarities between aquariums and dwc. I am fortunate that simply adding 10ml of Aquashield to my res every few days keeps things crystal clear, so I am interested in how bennies can colonize and help my roots.
You have said they thrive in soil, and really aren't of much use in hydro (summarizing more or less). Is it truly possible to have a colony of bennies living in the root zone, and what benefits would this provide beyond simply fighting root rot? I am hoping/assuming more resilient and faster growing roots, but maybe this is not the case or there is a point of diminishing returns... in other words DWC is already so oxygenated and the roots can explore where they please, there is no further exploration or benefits for the bennies to provide.
Another thing I have wondered about is the size of net pots. The past grows I have used 3.5" net pots (about the size of a red solo cup) and had OK roots. This grow I have switched to 8" net baskets that hold 1gallon of hydroton. With the bigger net basket, there is less water and more hydroton/air. I have been top feeding with aquashield in hopes that it might colonize the hydroton, and since it is not submersed in water, maybe the bennies will respond in a more soil-like fashion if that makes sense or is possible. The outcome I hope for is that the roots will explode in the net basket as far as fishboning and hairs, with massive tap roots in the bucket acting like a nute solution super charger injection... I am also going to add some lava rock to the buckets next payday; I just started some seedlings and no substantial roots yet.
An unrelated question if you have time... have you ever thought if bubbles or water current strengthen roots the same way wind strengthens stems? I guess it would depend if roots are repaired like stems are, or just ignored and left to damp off.