Correction to: Linking Genes to Traits in Fungi.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Romero-Olivares AL
PROVIDER: S-EPMC8329815 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jul
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
Correction to: Linking Genes to Traits in Fungi.
Romero-Olivares A L AL Morrison E W EW Pringle A A Frey S D SD
Microbial ecology 20210701 1
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Project description:Fungi are mediators of the nitrogen and carbon cycles in terrestrial ecosystems. Examining how nitrogen uptake and organic matter decomposition potential differs in fungi can provide insight into the underlying mechanisms driving fungal ecological processes and ecosystem functioning. In this study, we assessed the frequency of genes encoding for specific enzymes that facilitate nitrogen uptake and organic matter decomposition in 879 fungal genomes with fungal taxa grouped into trait-based categories. Our linked gene-trait data approach revealed that gene frequencies vary across and within trait-based groups and that trait-based categories differ in trait space. We present two examples of how this linked gene-trait approach can be used to address ecological questions. First, we show that this type of approach can help us better understand, and potentially predict, how fungi will respond to environmental stress. Specifically, we found that trait-based categories with high nitrogen uptake gene frequency increased in relative abundance when exposed to high soil nitrogen enrichment. Second, by comparing frequencies of nitrogen uptake and organic matter decomposition genes, we found that most ectomycorrhizal fungi in our dataset have similar gene frequencies to brown rot fungi. This demonstrates that gene-trait data approaches can shed light on potential evolutionary trajectories of life history traits in fungi. We present a framework for exploring nitrogen uptake and organic matter decomposition gene frequencies in fungal trait-based groups and provide two concise examples on how to use our framework to address ecological questions from a mechanistic perspective.
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Project description:[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0204128.].
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Project description:Colonization of terrestrial environments by filamentous fungi relies on their ability to form networks that can forage for and connect resource patches. Despite the importance of these networks, ecologists rarely consider network features as functional traits because their measurement and interpretation are conceptually and methodologically difficult. To address these challenges, we have developed a pipeline to translate images of fungal mycelia, from both micro- and macro-scales, to weighted network graphs that capture ecologically relevant fungal behaviour. We focus on four properties that we hypothesize determine how fungi forage for resources, specifically: connectivity; relative construction cost; transport efficiency; and robustness against attack by fungivores. Constrained ordination and Pareto front analysis of these traits revealed that foraging strategies can be distinguished predominantly along a gradient of connectivity for micro- and macro-scale mycelial networks that is reminiscent of the qualitative 'phalanx' and 'guerilla' descriptors previously proposed in the literature. At one extreme are species with many inter-connections that increase the paths for multidirectional transport and robustness to damage, but with a high construction cost; at the other extreme are species with an opposite phenotype. Thus, we propose this approach represents a significant advance in quantifying ecological strategies for fungi using network information.
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