One fungus dominates leaves of plants with opposite seasonal habits
Rodrigues MOS, Dos Reis JBA, Martins A, Pinho DB, Albernaz LC
Native Plants
Every leaf you see, whether on a backyard shrub or a savanna tree, hosts a hidden fungal community that can protect it from disease or quietly turn into a pathogen, and this study shows those communities can stay remarkably stable no matter how the plant's growth calendar changes.
Scientists cultured fungi living inside the leaves of two native Brazilian savanna plants, one evergreen and one that drops its leaves each year. They expected the different leaf-shedding timing to produce very different fungal neighborhoods, but instead the same fungus, called Diaporthe, dominated both plants and the overall communities looked strikingly similar. The one twist: in the leaf-dropping tree, Diaporthe's close relatives clustered together more than expected, hinting that seasonal leaf loss might subtly nudge which related fungal strains thrive.
Key Findings
365 fungal isolates were cultured from two Cerrado plant species, with Diaporthe as the overwhelmingly dominant genus in both hosts.
Beta diversity showed no significant difference in fungal community composition between the evergreen and deciduous host (PERMANOVA, p > 0.05), and 72.4% of fungal genera were host-specialists.
Diaporthe showed significant negative correlations with Penicillium and Colletotrichum (p < 0.001), and displayed significant phylogenetic clustering only in the deciduous host (NTI = 0.75, p = 0.042) versus a stochastic pattern in the evergreen host (NTI = -0.60, p = 0.677).
chevron_right Technical Summary
Researchers found that a single fungus genus, Diaporthe, dominates the leaf microbiome of two very different Brazilian savanna plants, one that keeps its leaves year-round and one that drops them seasonally, suggesting host leaf-shedding schedule matters less than expected for shaping these fungal communities.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
Taxonomic and functional inferences of cultivable endophytic fungi in two endemic Cerrado plants: dominance of Diaporthe across contrasting host phenologies.
Host phenology is an important determinant of the microbial community, yet how it shapes the evolution and function of endophytic fungi in native plants of the Cerrado remains poorly understood. We...
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