Correction to: Nature Microbiology https://doi.org/10.1038/s41564-024-01727-5, published online 17 June 2024.

In the version of the article initially published, the reference Schultze, M. et al. Rhizobium meliloti produces a family of sulphated lipooligosaccharides exhibiting different degrees of plant host specificity. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 89, 192–196 (1992) was missing and has now been added as ref. 61 and cited in the first sentence of the “Production and purification of NFs” section of the Methods. Additionally, thanks to E. Kondorosi (Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Hungary) and R. Li (Sun Yat-sen University, China) has now been added to the Acknowledgements. These corrections have been made to the HTML and PDF versions of the article.