Abundance, origin, and phylogeny of plants do not predict community-level patterns of pathogen diversity and infection.

ABSTRACT: Pathogens have the potential to shape plant community structure, and thus, it is important to understand the factors that determine pathogen diversity and infection in communities. The abundance, origin, and evolutionary relationships of plant hosts are all known to influence pathogen patterns and are typically studied separately. We present an observational study that examined the influence of all three factors and their interactions on the diversity of and infection of several broad taxonomic groups of foliar, floral, and stem pathogens across three sites in a temperate grassland in the central United States. Despite that pathogens are known to respond positively to increases in their host abundances in other systems, we found no relationship between host abundance and either pathogen di

SUBMITTER: Schmidt R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7319236 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature