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Updated: Jul 19, 2025

Isolation of Culturable Yeasts and Molds from Soils to Investigate Fungal Population Structure
Published on: May 27, 2022
Niche and ecosystem preference of earliest diverging fungi in soils
Jiarui Yang1,2,3, Juanli Yun2,4, Xingzhong Liu1,3,5
1State Key Laboratory of Mycology, Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
Abstract:
Within the supergroup Rotosphaeromycetes, or "Holomycota"/"Nucletmycea", there are several well-recognised unicellular clades in the earliest diverging fungi (EDF). However, we know little about their occurrence. Here, we investigated EDF in the rhizosphere and bulk soils from cropland, forest, orchard, and wetland ecosystems around the Beijing-Hebei area, China, to illustrate their niche and ecosystem preference. More than 500 new operational taxonomic units (OTUs) of EDF were detected based on the 18S rRNA genes. Microsporida and Aphelida constitute dominant groups, whereas Rozellosporida was quite rare. Although the EDF community was site-specific, the soil chemical characteristics, vegetation, and other eukaryotic microorganisms were the key factors driving the occurrence of EDF. Moreover, the stochastic process consisted the most of the EDF community assembly.
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