Will Argiroff, former PhD student in SEAS, has a new paper out titled “Fungal community composition and genetic potential regulate fine root decay in northern temperate forests” that examined if fine root litter (~50% total litter production in forest ecosystems and fairly recalcitrant) decayed more rapidly when fungal communities have more genes that are known to degrade litter. The study also looked into if you could classify fungi by saprotrophic or ectomycorrhizal functional groups by the genes present. Fine roots were placed in forest sites and the fungal communities were sequenced, which where then compared to available fungal genomes to examine decay genes. Fine root decay occurred more rapidly where fungi had more decay genes and was correlated with saprotrophs that degrade lignin (negatively so with ECM). The paper is out in Molecular Ecology can be found here.
