We studied the effect of ectomycorrhizas and fertilization on soil microbial communities associated with roots of 10-year-old loblolly pine. Ectomycorrhizas were identified using a combination of community terminal restriction fragment profiling and matching of individual terminal restriction fragments to those produced from ectomycorrhizal clones and sequences recovered from roots and sporocar...

Tuber pseudoexcavatum, Tuber sinoaestivum, and Tuber indicum are the 3 most important truffles growing in southeast China; however, their cultivation is still inefficient owing to the lack of understanding regarding the composition and function of the bacterial and fungal communities from the soils around the fruit bodies and the ectomycorrhiza of these truffles. The aim of this study was to di...

Bryophytes are a dominant and functionally important component of the forest floor vegetation in boreal forests, yet little is known about the fungal diversity associated with these abundant plants. Using molecular identification, we document an ecologically and phylogenetically diverse array of fungi associated with the living parts of three widespread and abundant boreal forest bryophytes, i....

Introduction The mycelium of woodland fungi can act both as a reservoir and as a distribution system for nutrients, owing to its physiological and developmental adaptations to life at the interface between organic and mineral soil horizons. The mobility of accumulated nitrogen and phosphorus within the mycelial networks of cord-forming wood decay fungi and ectomycorrhiza enables fungi to play k...

The present paper analyses the community structure of ectomycorrhiza (ECM) and arbuscular mycorrhiza (AM) fungi associated with seven different poplar clone types growing in a patch system on soil from four different former land use types, originating from spruce forest, poplar stand, grassland and cornfield. We determined the extent to which ECM and AM play a role on the studied factors (genot...

The ectomycorrhizal fungi Cenococcum geophilum, Hebeloma crustuliniforme, and Laccaria laccata produced ethylene in vitro in modified Melin-Norkrans liquid medium only if amended with 2.5-10mM methionine; Pisolithus tinctorius failed to produce ethylene unless the cultures were renewed with fresh methionine-amended medium before ethylene assay. An additional 19 ectomycorrhizal fungi, plus five ...

Soil fungi associated with plant roots, notably ectomycorrhizal (EcM) fungi, are central in above- and below-ground interactions in Mediterranean forests. They are a key component in soil nutrient cycling and plant productivity. Yet, major disturbances of Mediterranean forests, particularly in the Southern Mediterranean basin, are observed due to the greater human pressures and climate changes....

Present knowledge on plant non-symbiotic class-1 (Hb1) and truncated (TrHb) haemoglobin genes is almost entirely based on herbaceous species while the corresponding tree haemoglobin genes are not well known. The function of these genes has recently been linked with endosymbioses between plants and microbes. In this work, the coding sequences of hybrid aspen (Populus tremulaxtremuloides) PttHb1 ...

Formation of ectomycorrhizas, a symbiosis with fine roots of woody plants, is one way for soil fungi to overcome carbohydrate limitation in forest ecosystems. Fifteen potential hexose transporter proteins, of which 10 group within three clusters, are encoded in the genome of the ectomycorrhizal model fungus Laccaria bicolor. For 14 of them, transcripts were detectable. When grown in liquid cult...

Ectomycorrhizal (ECM) symbiosis has been proposed to link plant photosynthesis and soil organic matter (SOM) decomposition through the production of fungal enzymes which promote SOM degradation and nitrogen (N) uptake. However, laboratory and field evidence for the existence of these processes are rare. Piloderma sp., a common ECM genus in boreal forest soil, was chosen as model mycorrhiza for ...