Comparative sampling of Neotropical and Paleotropical elevation gradients reveals the role of climate in shaping the functional and taxonomic composition of soil-borne fungal communities in tropical forests

GEML, JÓZSEF; ARNOLD, ANNE ELIZABETH; SEMENOVA TATIANA; NOUHRA EDUARDO

Authorea

wiley publishing

Lugar: New Jersey; Año: 2020

2515-9569

Because of their steep gradients in abiotic and biotic factors, mountains offer an ideal setting to enhance our understandingof mechanisms that underlie species distributions and community assemblies. We compared the structure of taxonomicallyand functionally diverse soil fungal communities in soils along elevational gradients in the Neo- and Paleotropics (northernArgentina, Central America, and Borneo). We found that soil fungal community composition reflects environmental factorsat both regional and pantropical scales, particularly temperature and soil pH. Elevational turnover is driven by contrastingenvironmental preferences among functional groups and replacement of species within functional guilds. In addition, we foundthat habitat preference can already be observed at the level of taxonomic orders, often irrespective of functional guild, whichsuggests shared physiological constraints and environmental optimum for relatively closely related taxa. Strong biogeographicstructure likely reflects dispersal limitation and resulting differences in local species pools of fungi, as well as their hosts orsubstrates. Although the number of species shared among regions is low, remarkable similarity of functional profiles acrossregions suggests functional niche proportions may be driven by similar mechanisms across moist tropical forests, resulting inrelatively predictable proportions of functional guilds. The pronounced compositional and functional turnover along elevationgradients driven mainly by temperature and correlated environmental factors implies that tropical montane forest fungi willlikely be sensitive to climate change, resulting in variation in composition and functionality over time