Yay! A Fungi talk! - Thomas Sharpton

// fungus are among us - Ruchira S. Datta

Slide showing that humans impact biodiversity. Largest effect? Land-use change - Thomas Sharpton

Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. Prior work (gibson 2011) finds that the loss of primary forest is significant. Only have evaluated macroscopic organisms at this point. - Thomas Sharpton

Amazon Rainforest Microbial Observatory is being highlighted. I want to go to there. - Thomas Sharpton

// too many mosquitoes! - Ruchira S. Datta

@Ruchria - Fair point. I hear a drier sheet in your back pocket helps - Thomas Sharpton

// never heard that one before, thanks - Ruchira S. Datta

Used a spatially-explicit sampling design to study alpha and beta diversity. Used Illumina to target and sequence ITS region of fungal genomes - Thomas Sharpton

Richness is increased in pastures compared to forests. secondary forests also lower richness relative to pasture site - Thomas Sharpton

Most of the change seems to be among Ascomycota (up in pasture) and Basidiomycota (down in pasture) - Thomas Sharpton

Now introducing AM fungi, noting that they affect ecosystem function - Thomas Sharpton

AMF are the dominant association in most tropical forests - Thomas Sharpton

Focusing just on the AMF, finds that richness increases in pastures (as above) - Thomas Sharpton

However, in pastures, there is no significant relationship between geographic distance and community diversity. In forests, there is. - Thomas Sharpton

Community composition shifts with deforestation - Thomas Sharpton

Similar response of bacterial communities between sites. - Thomas Sharpton

Local richness was higher in pastures, but turnover was lower. AMF diversity may decrease over larger scales in response to deforestation. - Thomas Sharpton