Glomerales Dominate Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungal Communities Associated with Spontaneous Plants in Phosphate-Rich Soils of Former Rock Phosphate Mining Sites

Amandine Ducousso-Détrez; Robin Raveau; Joël Fontaine; Mohamed Hijri; Anissa Lounès-Hadj Sahraoui

doi:10.3390/microorganisms10122406

Glomerales Dominate Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungal Communities Associated with Spontaneous Plants in Phosphate-Rich Soils of Former Rock Phosphate Mining Sites

Microorganisms. 2022 Dec 5;10(12):2406. doi: 10.3390/microorganisms10122406.

Authors

Amandine Ducousso-Détrez^{1

2}, Robin Raveau³, Joël Fontaine¹, Mohamed Hijri^{2

4}, Anissa Lounès-Hadj Sahraoui¹

Affiliations

¹ Unité de Chimie Environnementale et Interactions sur le Vivant (UCEIV), Université du Littoral Côte d'Opale, UR 4492, SFR Condorcet FR CNRS 3417, CEDEX, 62228 Calais, France.
² Institut de Recherche en Biologie Végétale (IRBV), 3 AgroBioSciences, Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC H1X 2B2, Canada.
³ INRAE, UMR SAVE, Bordeaux Science Agro, ISVV, 33882 Villenave d'Ornon, France.
⁴ African Genome Center, Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P), Ben Guerir 43150, Morocco.

Abstract

Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) are key drivers of soil functioning. They interact with multiple soil parameters, notably, phosphorus (P). In this work, AMF communities of native plants grown spontaneously on former mining sites either enriched (P sites) or not enriched with P (nP sites) by mining cuttings of rock phosphate (RP) were studied. No significant differences were observed in the root mycorrhizal rates of the plants when comparing P and nP sites. The assessment of AMF diversity and community structure using Illumina MiSeq metabarcoding and targeting 18S rDNA in roots and rhizospheric soils showed a total of 318 Amplicon Sequence Variants (ASVs) of Glomeromycota phylum. No significant difference in the diversity was found between P and nP sites. Glomeraceae species were largely dominant, formed a fungal core of 26 ASVs, and were persistent and abundant in all sites. In the P soils, eight ASVs were identified by indicator species analysis. A trend towards an increase in Diversisporaceae and Claroideoglomeraceae and a reduction in Paraglomeraceae and Glomeraceae were noticed. These results provide new insights into AMF ecology in former RP mining sites; they document that P concentration is a driver of AMF community structures in soils enriched in RP long term but also suggest an influence of land disturbance, ecosystem self-restoration, and AMF life history strategies as drivers of AMF community profiles.

Keywords: arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi; diversity; phosphorus; rock phosphate; taxonomic composition.

Grants and funding

This work was carried out within the framework of the ALIBIOTECH and BiHauts Eco de France projects which are funded by the European Union, the French State, and the French Region of Hauts-de-France as well as the TRIPLET project financed by A2U. This research was also funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) to MH, Grant Number RGPIN-2018-04178. The authors wish to thank the “Université de Montréal” and the “Région des Hauts de France” for providing financial support to the ADD PhD thesis.