Oxygen in marsh soil decides which fungi live in roots
Mycorrhizal Networks
Waterlogged, oxygen-starved soil in your garden's low spots likely shuts out the beneficial root fungi that help plants take up nutrients, so improving drainage can invite them back.
Salt marshes run from sea-soaked mud to drier land, and the fungi inside plant roots change along that path. Where the soil holds more oxygen, helpful fungi that trade nutrients with roots become much more common, growing from almost none to about one in seven root sections colonized. Even in the same spot, different plant species pick different fungal partners.
Key Findings
Arbuscular colonization of roots rose from 0.04 ± 0.17% in low marine-dominated zones to 14.05 ± 8.61% at higher terrestrial elevations.
Relative amplicon abundance of Glomeromycota increased from 0.85 ± 2.55% to 19.75 ± 11.77% along the same elevation gradient.
Soil redox potential, a proxy for oxygen availability, correlated with the fungal shift (RDA, R2 = 0.05, p = 0.004), and host plant species identity further structured fungal communities within a zone.
chevron_right Technical Summary
Fungi living in plant roots change sharply across salt marshes, with helpful root-partnering fungi becoming far more common on higher, better-aerated ground. Soil oxygen availability and the plant species itself both shape which fungi show up.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
Soil redox potential and plant species identity likely affect root-associated fungi in salt marshes
Abstract Root-associated fungi (RAF) are important for plant performance because they form beneficial, neutral, or pathogenic relationships with their hosts, thus regulating nutrient uptake, stress...
open_in_new Read full abstractAbstract copyright held by the original publisher.
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