Non-native Plant Species Invasion Increases the Importance of Deterministic Processes in Fungal Community Assembly in a Coastal Wetland

Microb Ecol. 2022 Nov 14. doi: 10.1007/s00248-022-02144-z. Online ahead of print.ABSTRACTFungal communities are essential to the maintenance of soil multifunctionality. Plant invasion represents a growing challenge for the conservation of soil biodiversity across the globe, but the impact of non-native species invasion on fungal diversity, community structure, and assembly processes remains largely unknown. Here, we examined the diversity, community composition, functional guilds, and assembly process of fungi at three soil depths underneath a native species, three non-native species, and a bare tidal flat from a coastal wetland. Plant species was more important than soil depth in regulating the diversity, community structure, and functional groups of fungi. Non-native species, especially Spartina alterniflora, increased fungal diversity, altered fungal community structure, and increased the relative abundance of saprotrophic and pathogenic fungi in coastal wetland soils. Stochastic processes played a predominant role in driving fungal community assembly, explaining more than 70% of the relative contributions. However, compared to a native species, non-native species, especially S. alterniflora, reduced the relative influence of stochastic processes in fungal community assembly. Collectively, our results provide novel evidence that non-native species can increase fungal diversity, the relative abundance of saprotrophic and pathogenic fungi, and deterministic processes in the ...

Source: Microbial Ecology - November 13, 2022 Category: Microbiology Authors: Guiping Ye Jianming Chen Ping Yang Hang-Wei Hu Zi-Yang He Dan Wang Dingding Cao Wenbin Zhang Bingyu Wu Yonghong Wu Xiangying Wei Yongxin Lin Source Type: research