Wood wide web: Trees' social networks are mapped
Research has shown that beneath every forest and wood there is a complex underground web of roots, fungi and bacteria helping to connect trees and plants to one another.
This subterranean social network, nearly 500 million years old, has become known as the "wood wide web".
Now, an international study has produced the first global map of the "mycorrhizal fungi networks" dominating this secretive world.
Details appear in Nature journal.
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Using millions of direct observations of trees and their symbiotic associations on the ground, the researchers could build models from the bottom up to visualise these fungal networks for the first time.
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The research reveals how important mycorrhizal networks are to limiting climate change - and how vulnerable they are to the effects of it.
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Mycorrhizal fungi are those that form a symbiotic relationship with plants.
There are two main groups of mycorrhizal fungi: arbuscular fungi (AM) that penetrate the hosts's roots, and ectomycorrhizal fungi (EM) which surround the tree's roots without penetrating them.
EM fungi, mostly present in temperate and boreal systems, help lock up more carbon from the atmosphere. They are more vulnerable to climate change.
AM fungi, more dominant in the tropics, promote fast carbon cycling.
According to the research, 60% of trees are connected to EM fungi, but, as temperatures rise, these fungi - and their associated tree species - will decline and be replaced by AM fungi.
"The types of fungi that support huge carbon stores in the soil are being lost and are being replaced by the ones that spew out carbon in to the atmosphere."
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-48257315