Potential for functional divergence in ectomycorrhizal fungal communities across a precipitation gradient.

ABSTRACT: Functional traits influence the assembly of microbial communities, but identifying these traits in the environment has remained challenging. We studied ectomycorrhizal fungal (EMF) communities inhabiting Populus trichocarpa roots distributed across a precipitation gradient in the Pacific Northwest, USA. We profiled these communities using taxonomic (meta-barcoding) and functional (metagenomic) approaches. We hypothesized that genes involved in fungal drought-stress tolerance and fungal mediated plant water uptake would be most abundant in drier soils. We were unable to detect support for this hypothesis; instead, the abundance of genes involved in melanin synthesis, hydrophobins, aquaporins, trehalose-synthases, and other gene families exhibited no significant shifts across the grad

SUBMITTER: Pellitier PT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10960952 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature