Darkness visible: reflections on underground ecology

1 Soil science and ecology have developed independently, making it difficult for ecologists to contribute to urgent current debates on the destruction of the global soil resource and its key role in the global carbon cycle. Soils are believed to be exceptionally biodiverse parts of ecosystems, a view confirmed by recent data from the UK Soil Biodiversity Programme at Sourhope, Scotland, where high diversity was a characteristic of small organisms, but not of larger ones. Explaining this difference requires knowledge that we currently lack about the basic biology and biogeography of micro-organisms. 2 It seems inherently plausible that the high levels of biological diversity in soil play some part in determining the ability of soils to undertake ecosystem-level processes, such as carbon and mineral cycling. However, we lack conceptual models to address this issue, and debate about the role of biodiversity in ecosystem processes has centred around the concept of functional redundancy, and has consequently been largely semantic. More precise construction of our experimental questions is needed to advance understanding. 3 These issues are well illustrated by the fungi that form arbuscular mycorrhizas, the Glomeromycota. This ancient symbiosis of plants and fungi is responsible for phosphate uptake in most land plants, and the phylum is generally held to be species-poor and non-specific, with most members readily colonizing any plant species. Molecular techniques have shown both those assumptions to be unsafe, raising questions about what factors have promoted diversification in these fungi. One source of this genetic diversity may be functional diversity. 4 Specificity of the mycorrhizal interaction between plants and fungi would have important ecosystem consequences. One example would be in the control of invasiveness in introduced plant species: surprisingly, naturalized plant species in Britain are disproportionately from mycorrhizal families, suggesting that these fungi may play a role in assisting invasion. 5 What emerges from an attempt to relate biodiversity and ecosystem processes in soil is our extraordinary ignorance about the organisms involved. There are fundamental questions that are now answerable with new techniques and sufficient will, such as how biodiverse are natural soils? Do microbes have biogeography? Are there rare or even endangered microbes

Caracterização fenotípica e molecular de esporos de fungos micorrízicos arbusculares mantidos em banco de germoplasma Phenotypic and molecular characterization of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal spores from cultures maintained in germplasm collection

O objetivo deste trabalho foi caracterizar fenotípica e genotipicamente isolados de espécies de fungos micorrízicos arbusculares (FMA) mantidos em cultura pura e avaliar a aplicabilidade da técnica PCR-DGGE desenvolvida para Gigaspora, na identificação molecular de espécies de FMA pertencentes a outros gêneros. A caracterização fenotípica das espécies foi realizada de acordo com critérios morfológicos, descritos pela taxonomia, e com uso de descrições originais das espécies presentes na literatura especializada. A análise genotípica foi feita com base na discriminação específica da região V9 do 18S rDNA, que permitiu a diferenciação das espécies e não revelou qualquer diferença entre os isolados geográficos de Glomus clarum, e entre os de Glomus etunicatum. Isto indica a aplicabilidade da técnica para a avaliação da pureza genética e discriminação de espécies de FMA.<br>The objective of this work was to characterize phenotypically and genotypically isolates of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) maintained in pure culture and to evaluate the applicability of PCR-DGGE analysis, developed for Gigaspora, for molecular identification of AMF species belonging to other genres. The species phenotypic characterization was done according to morphological criteria, as described by taxonomy, and according to original descriptions of species published in the specialized literature. The genotypic analysis was made through specific discrimination of the V9 region in the 18S rDNA, which allowed the distinction of species and showed no difference among geographical isolates of Glomus clarum, and among those of Glomus etunicatum. This indicates the applicability of this technique for assessment of genetic purity and discrimination of AMF species