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Isolation of Culturable Yeasts and Molds from Soils to Investigate Fungal Population Structure
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A genomic perspective on fungal diversity and evolution
Stephen J Mondo1,2,3, Igor V Grigoriev4,5,6
1US Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, USA.
Nature Reviews. Microbiology
|June 30, 2025
Summary
Fungal genomes reveal evolution over a billion years, showcasing diversification and complex structures. Genomics and multi-omics approaches provide insights, but challenges in genome representation and gene function characterization remain.
Area of Science:
- Mycology
- Evolutionary Biology
- Genomics
Background:
- Fungi evolved from aquatic unicellular ancestors over ~1 billion years.
- They diversified into millions of species occupying diverse aerobic environments.
- Fungal genomes are relatively small and simple, facilitating large-scale sequencing.
Purpose of the Study:
- To review insights into fungal biology and evolution using genomics and multi-omics.
- To highlight changes in fungal genomes over time using phylogenies.
- To discuss major evolutionary transitions within the fungal kingdom.
Main Methods:
- Utilized published fungal genomes from GenBank and MycoCosm.
- Generated kingdom-wide phylogenies to track genome evolution.
- Employed multi-omics approaches for comprehensive analysis.
Main Results:
- Fungal genomes have undergone significant changes throughout their evolutionary history.
- Phylogenies guided the discussion of key evolutionary transitions.
- Identified biases in genome representation and limited gene function data.
Conclusions:
- Genomics offers powerful insights into fungal evolution and biology.
- Addressing genome representation biases and characterizing gene functions are crucial next steps.
- Future initiatives aim to sequence and annotate 10,000 fungal genomes.
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