Unravelling Soil Fungal Communities from Different Land-Use Backgrounds.

Identifying a soil core microbiome is crucial to appreciate the established microbial consortium, which is not usually subject to change and is likely to be resilient to disturbances and edaphic shifts. Soil fungi are indispensable for carbon cycling and soil aggregate formation, mainly operating as decomposers, pathogens and mycorrhizal mutualists. Due to their large diversity, specialization, and important ecological functions, fungi are also excellent bio indicators (Lemanceau et al. 2015). For these reasons, investigating the fungal diversity and the ecological factors that underlie the dynamics of fungal species distribution becomes crucial for the ecological characterization of any given ecosystem. In this context, tag-assisted Next Generation Sequencing (454 GS FLX/Illumina) targeting the 18S or ITS region of the fungal rDNA represents a powerful approach for the analysis of soil fungal diversity and, specifically, for the disclosure of fungal taxa that are key to ecosystem functioning. Since 2010, we have been investigating fungal communities from different land-use backgrounds, including soils subjected to anthropogenic impact in a typical Mediterranean landscape (natural cork-oak forest, pasture, managed meadow, vineyards) (Lumini et al. 2010), European agroecosystems subjected to high input practice (maize, wheat, and rice), and soils from the native and naturalized range of broadleaf evergreen ornamental plants. These investigations have provided an overview of soil fungal diversity at the examined sites and important backbone data on the impact of environmental conditions (soil types, cover vegetation, and human activities) on fungal microbiome composition and structure. The characterisation of soil biodiversity in different types of soils may help in identifying practices that allow preserving soil organisms. Moreover, the ability to describe the spatial distribution of fungal communities is an important contribution towards the required characterization of the distribution of soil biodiversity on a global scale. In a context of increasing degradation and threat to the soils and their biodiversity, this goal represents a key step towards the development of practices that allow more sustainable management of soil, aimed at preserving its biodiversity.