Exploring de soil mycelium of two important edible ectomycorrhizal fungi, lactarius deliciosus and tuber melanosporum through the use of molecular techniques

Abstract

ABSTRACT I researched the direct effect of aboveground disturbances on ectomycorrhizal fungi by studying the effect of thinning a forest on the fruiting and mycelial biomass of Lactarius deliciosus in Pinus sylvestris and P. pinaster stands in Poblet, Spain. For a model of stand recovery from disturbance, I used the reestablishment of a Quercus ilex woodland with seedlings inoculated with Tuber melanosporum in Teruel, Spain.I detected L. deliciosus mycelium quantities from 0.0031 to 223 mg/g fresh soil and a positive relationship between sporocarp production and the quantity of mycelium. The quantity of T. melanosporum mycelium detected ranged from 0.007 to 39 µg/g freshsoil. There were greater quantities at 40 cm from the tree trunk than at 100 or 200 cm in younger plantations. We obtained 480 sequences from plantations of six ages that included 89 unique OTUs. The most abundant identified species were T. melanosporum and Fusarium oxysporum, which represented 34% and 13% of all OTUs.