Using lipid analysis and hyphal length to quantify AM and saprotrophic fungal abundance along a soil chronosequence

By T. Balser, K. Treseder, M. Ekenler. 2005

129 citations recorded by the source corpus.

We evaluate the use of signature fatty acids and direct hyphal counts as tools to detect and quantify arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) and saprotrophic fungal (SF) biomass in three Hawaiian soils along a natural soil fertility gradient. Phospholipids16:1ω5c and 18:2ω6,9c were used as an index of AM and saprotrophic fungal biomass, respectively. Both phospholipid analysis and hyphal length indicated that the biomass of AMF was greatest at the highest fertility site, and lowest where phosphorus limits plant growth. Saprotrophic fungal biomass did not vary. Hyphal length counts appeared to under-estimate SF abundance, while the phospholipid AMF:SF ratio was in line with expectations. This study indicates that phospholipids may be a valuable and reliable tool for studying the abundance, distribution, and interactions between AM and saprotrophic fungi in soil.

Subfields: Nature and Landscape Conservation, Plant Science, Soil Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/d5b095798f568d367e309b9ed7f820fa49af3afd

How researchers see this paper

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In Nature and Landscape Conservation

1. J. Joshi
2. Barbara C. Schmid
3. E. Paterson
4. J. Davidson
5. K. Scow
6. Chantal Hamel
7. A. Sim
8. S. Lacombe

In Plant Science

1. Barbara C. Schmid
2. Jeffrey P. Mitchell
3. J. Joshi
4. E. Paterson
5. J. Davidson
6. K. Scow
7. Chantal Hamel
8. A. Sim

In Soil Science

1. J. Joshi
2. Barbara C. Schmid
3. E. Paterson
4. J. Davidson
5. K. Scow
6. Chantal Hamel
7. A. Sim
8. T. Daniell

Citations in the corpus

• Flooding effects on soil microbial communities (2009, unknown): “Mycorrhizal markers were 16:1v5, cis16:1v5, 18:2v6, cis18:2v6, 18:2v9 (Balser et al., 2005; Belen Hinojosa et al., 2005).”
• Do tree-based intercropping systems increase the diversity and stability of soil microbial communities? (2009, background): “…in the case of a Sources: Fostegård and Bååth, 1996; Sundh et al., 1997; Zelles, 1999; Hill et al., 2000; Madan et al., 2002; Diaz-Ravina et al., 2006; Balser et al., 2005; Hamel et al., 2006; Rinnan et al., 2007. departure from normality in the data, and the latter is entirely nonparametric.”
• Cover cropping and no-till increase diversity and symbiotroph:saprotroph ratios of soil fungal communities (2019, background): “Far less is known about other groups of fungi such as the saproptrophs that make up 50–80% of the overall fungal community (Balser et al., 2005; Nguyen et al., 2016), although saprotrophs that colonize fresh, mature plant residues turned into the soil by tillage have been shown to increase under sta”
• Soil feedbacks of plant diversity on soil microbial communities and subsequent plant growth (2005, background): “Microbial biomass in soils after 14 months of phytometer growth, represented by total PLFA content (Zelles et al., 1992; Hill et al., 1993; Balser et al., 2005), was not influenced by soil carry-over effects.”
• Arbuscular mycorrhizal hyphae promote priming of native soil organic matter mineralisation (2016, methodology): “…from the plant host (Ho and Trappe 1973), the continuous, quantitative labelling approach applied, coupled with compound specific lipid analyses allowed direct assessment of PLFA and NLFA 16:1ω5 as AM biomarkers (van Aarle and Olsson; Balser et al. 2005; Nilsson et al. 2005; Herman et al. 2012).”
• Soil microbial quality associated with yield reduction in continuous-pea (2009, methodology): “The PLFA 18:2, 18:1c and 18:1t were used as indicators of saprophytic fungal biomass (Frostegård and Bååth, 1996; Petersen and Klug, 1994), and PLFA 16:1v5 as an indicator of AM fungi (Balser et al., 2005; Spring et al., 2000).”