{"666118":{"#nid":"666118","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Mycorrhizal Types Control Biodiversity Effects on Productivity","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cem\u003EThis news release first appeared in the \u003C\/em\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/english.cas.cn\/newsroom\/research_news\/life\/202301\/t20230119_326441.shtml\u0022 target=\u0022_blank\u0022\u003E\u003Cem\u003EChinese Academy of Sciences\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cem\u003E\u0026nbsp;newsroom, and has been tailored for Georgia Tech readers.\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EMycorrhizal symbiosis \u2014 a symbiotic relationship that can exist between fungi and plant roots \u2014 helps plants expand their root surface area, giving plants greater access to nutrients and water. Although the first and foremost role of mycorrhizal symbiosis is to facilitate plant nutrition, scientists have not been clear how mycorrhizal types mediate the nutrient acquisition and interactions of coexisting trees in forests.\u0026nbsp;\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ETo investigate this crucial relationship,\u0026nbsp;\u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/people.ucas.ac.cn\/~lingliliu?language=en\u0022\u003ELingli Liu\u003C\/a\u003E, a professor at the Institute of Botany of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IBCAS) led an international, collaborative team, which included\u0026nbsp;\u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/biosciences.gatech.edu\/\u0022\u003ESchool of Biological Sciences\u003C\/a\u003Eprofessor\u0026nbsp;\u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/biosciences.gatech.edu\/people\/lin-jiang\u0022\u003ELin Jiang\u003C\/a\u003E. The team studied nutrient acquisition strategies of arbuscular mycorrhizae (AM) and ectomycorrhizal (EcM) trees in the Biodiversity\u2013Ecosystem Functioning (BEF) experiment in a subtropical forest in China, where trees of the two mycorrhizal types were initially evenly planted in mixtures of two, four, eight, or 16 tree species.\u0026nbsp;\u0026nbsp;\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe researchers found that as the diversity of species increased, the net primary production (NPP) of EcM trees rapidly decreased, but the NPP of AM trees progressively increased, leading to the sheer dominance (\u0026gt;90%) of AM trees in the highest diversity treatment.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe team\u0027s analyses further revealed that differences in mycorrhizal nutrient-acquisition strategies, both nutrient acquisition from soil and nutrient resorption within the plant, contribute to the competitive edge of AM trees over EcM ones.\u0026nbsp;\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn addition, analysis of soil microbial communities showed that EcM-tree monocultures have a high abundance of symbiotic fungi, whereas AM-tree monocultures were dominated by saprotrophic and pathogenic fungi.\u0026nbsp;\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAccording to the researchers, as tree richness increased, shifts in microbial communities, particularly a decrease in the relative abundance of Agaricomycetes (mainly EcM fungi), corresponded with a decrease in the NPP of EcM subcommunities, but had a relatively small impact on the NPP of AM subcommunities.\u0026nbsp;\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThese findings suggest that more efficient nutrient-acquisition strategies, rather than microbial-mediated negative plant-soil feedback, drive the dominance of AM trees in high-diversity ecosystems.\u0026nbsp;\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThis study, based on the world\u2019s largest forest BEF experiment, provides novel data and an alternative mechanism for explaining why and how AM trees usually dominate in high-diversity subtropical forests.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThese findings also have practical implications for species selection in tropical and subtropical reforestation\u2014suggesting it is preferable to plant mixed AM trees, as they have a more efficient nutrient-acquisition strategy than EcM trees.\u0026nbsp;\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThis study was published as an online cover article in\u0026nbsp;\u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.science.org\/doi\/10.1126\/sciadv.add4468\u0022\u003E\u003Cem\u003ESciences Advances\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/a\u003E\u0026nbsp;on Jan. 19 and was funded by the Strategic Priority Research Program of CAS and the National Natural Science Foundation of China.\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":"","format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EAn international, collaborative team of researchers shed light on how fungi and plant roots work together to gather nutrients \u0026mdash; and how the diversity of plant species may impact the process.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"An international, collaborative team of researchers shed light on how fungi and plant roots work together to gather nutrients \u2014 and how the diversity of plant species may impact the process."}],"uid":"35575","created_gmt":"2023-02-23 21:01:21","changed_gmt":"2025-10-30 14:45:57","author":"adavidson38","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2023-02-23T00:00:00-05:00","iso_date":"2023-02-23T00:00:00-05:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"666119":{"id":"666119","type":"image","title":"Fungi growing on plants in a forest","body":null,"created":"1677186313","gmt_created":"2023-02-23 21:05:13","changed":"1677186313","gmt_changed":"2023-02-23 21:05:13","alt":"","file":{"fid":"251905","name":"Untitled design-7.png","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/Untitled%20design-7.png","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/Untitled%20design-7.png","mime":"image\/png","size":3506790,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/Untitled%20design-7.png?itok=KqPjf1ac"}}},"media_ids":["666119"],"related_links":[{"url":"https:\/\/www.science.org\/doi\/10.1126\/sciadv.add4468","title":"Tree mycorrhizal association types control biodiversity-productivity relationship in a subtropical forest"},{"url":"https:\/\/cos.gatech.edu\/news\/center-teaching-and-learning-recognizes-sciences-faculty-educational-excellence","title":"Center for Teaching and Learning Recognizes Sciences Faculty for Educational Excellence"}],"groups":[{"id":"1278","name":"College of Sciences"},{"id":"1188","name":"Research Horizons"}],"categories":[{"id":"146","name":"Life Sciences and Biology"},{"id":"135","name":"Research"}],"keywords":[{"id":"192250","name":"cos-microbial"},{"id":"192221","name":"Mycorrhizal"},{"id":"20751","name":"Lin Jiang"},{"id":"184630","name":"Science Advances"},{"id":"166882","name":"School of Biological Sciences"},{"id":"187915","name":"go-researchnews"}],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"39441","name":"Bioengineering and Bioscience"},{"id":"194566","name":"Sustainable Systems"}],"news_room_topics":[{"id":"71911","name":"Earth and Environment"}],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EGeorgia Tech Editor: \u003Ca href=\u0022mailto:davidson.audra@gatech.edu\u0022\u003EAudra Davidson\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cbr\u003ECommunications Officer II\u003Cbr\u003ECollege of Sciences\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["jess@cos.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}