fungi
- Editor's Pick Research Article | Ecological and Evolutionary ScienceComplementary Roles of Wood-Inhabiting Fungi and Bacteria Facilitate Deadwood Decomposition
Wood represents a globally important stock of C, and its mineralization importantly contributes to the global C cycle. Microorganisms play a key role in deadwood decomposition, since they possess enzymatic tools for the degradation of recalcitrant plant polymers.
- Research Article | Host-Microbe BiologyPlant Hosts Modify Belowground Microbial Community Response to Extreme Drought
Climate change causes significant alterations in precipitation and temperature regimes that are predicted to become more extreme throughout the next century. Microorganisms are important members within ecosystems, and how they respond to these changing abiotic stressors has large implications for the functioning of ecosystems, the recycling of nutrients, and the health of the aboveground plant community. Drought stress negatively...
- Research Article | Ecological and Evolutionary ScienceThe Gut Microbiota Communities of Wild Arboreal and Ground-Feeding Tropical Primates Are Affected Differently by Habitat Disturbance
Gut microbiota diversity has become the subject of extensive research in human and nonhuman animals, linking diversity and composition to gut function and host health. Because wild primates are good indicators of tropical ecosystem health, we developed the idea that they are a suitable model to observe the consequences of advancing global change (e.g., habitat degradation) on gut microbiota. So far, most of the studies focus mainly on...
- Research Article | Ecological and Evolutionary ScienceSpatial Variation in Soil Fungal Communities across Paddy Fields in Subtropical China
In this work, Illumina MiSeq amplicon sequencing of the ITS region was used to investigate the spatial variation and assembly mechanisms of fungal communities from different soil layers across paddy fields in subtropical China, and the results demonstrate the decreasing importance of environmental filtering and an increase in the importance of dispersal limitation in structuring fungal communities from shallower to deeper soils....
- Research Article | Ecological and Evolutionary ScienceSelection, Succession, and Stabilization of Soil Microbial Consortia
The soil microbiome carries out important ecosystem functions, but interactions between soil microbial communities have been difficult to study due to the high microbial diversity and complexity of the soil habitat. In this study, we successfully obtained stable consortia with reduced complexity that contained species found in the original source soil. These consortia and the methods used to obtain them can be a valuable resource for...
- Research Article | Molecular Biology and PhysiologyGenomic Characterization and Virulence Potential of Two Fusarium oxysporum Isolates Cultured from the International Space Station
This is the first study to isolate and characterize F. oxysporum isolates from a built environment, as well as one that has been exposed to space. The characterization and analysis of these two genomes may have important implications for the medical, agricultural, and food industries as well as for the health of the crew who coinhabit the ISS with these strains.
... - Special Issue Perspective | Host-Microbe BiologyMicrobial Eukaryotes: a Missing Link in Gut Microbiome Studies
Human-associated microbial communities include prokaryotic and eukaryotic organisms across high-level clades of the tree of life. While advances in high-throughput sequencing technology allow for the study of diverse lineages, the vast majority of studies are limited to bacteria, and very little is known on how eukaryote microbes fit in the overall microbial ecology of the human gut.
- Research Article | Clinical Science and EpidemiologyDevelopment of the Human Mycobiome over the First Month of Life and across Body Sites
Humans are colonized by diverse fungi (mycobiome), which have received much less study to date than colonizing bacteria. We know very little about the succession of fungal colonization in early life and whether it may relate to long-term health. To better understand fungal colonization and its sources, we studied the skin, oral, and anal mycobiomes of healthy term infants and the vaginal and anal mycobiomes of their mothers. Generally,...
- Editor's Pick Research Article | Applied and Environmental ScienceGeography and Location Are the Primary Drivers of Office Microbiome Composition
Our study highlights several points that should impact the design of future studies of the microbiology of BEs. First, projects tracking changes in BE bacterial communities should focus sampling efforts on surveying different locations in offices and in different cities but not necessarily different materials or different offices in the same city. Next, disturbance due to repeated sampling, though detectable, is small compared to that...