As part of the MST's membership in the Myco-Consortium series of Zoom talks, MST members are invited to join the presentation on Thursday, April 24th at 7:30pm EDT:
Mycorrhizal Fungi Supporting Forests of the Future
A talk by Benton Taylor Thursday April 24th, 7:30pm EDT
As human activity continues to pour CO2 into the atmosphere, terrestrial ecosystems are becoming increasingly important natural carbon sinks that help mitigate this atmospheric carbon accumulation. Currently, terrestrial ecosystems take up and sequester 1/3 of humans’ annual carbon emissions, but how long this so-called “CO2 Fertilization” effect will persist is highly uncertain. Plants’ continued ability to take up nutrients from the soil is critical for CO2 fertilization to occur, and their primary means of doing so in most ecosystems is through partnerships with mycorrhizal fungi. This talk will explore experimental evidence from both temperate and tropical forests on the increased role that belowground mycorrhizal partnerships will play in supporting nutrient acquisition, tree growth, and terrestrial carbon sequestration in a future CO2-enriched world.
About Benton Taylor
Dr. Ben Taylor is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University. His research focuses broadly on how terrestrial ecosystems respond to various aspects of global change and what those responses will mean for the future of terrestrial ecosystems to capture and store carbon. Specifically, work in the Taylor lab addresses how key partnerships between plant roots and soil microbes, such as mycorrhizal fungi and nitrogen-fixing bacteria, will impact how plants respond to increases in atmospheric CO2, temperature, drought, human land use, and other anthropogenically driven changes.
James Scott's presentation Mycology: The Board Game of Foraging for Fungi is now available to MST members to watch on the meetings video page.
Mycology: The Board Game of Foraging for Fungi is a strategy-based tabletop game designed by James Scott. This speaker series will provide an introduction to the game, followed by an open Q&A session with Dr. James Scott.
James Scott is a Professor at the University of Toronto specializing in mycology and microbiology. He is the Director of the UAMH Centre for Global Microfungal Biodiversity which operates a large biorepository of living fungi of medical and environmental importance. Much of Dr. Scott’s research focuses on interactions between people and microorganisms, especially fungi, but also algae, protozoa, bacteria, and viruses. His work addresses the detection, taxonomy, ecology and aerobiology of human-associated microbes responsible for infectious, allergic and toxin-mediated disease. Since 2002, he has served as a consultant to the Ontario Poison Centre on mushroom poisonings, and to Dynacare Medical Laboratories on human fungal diseases. In addition to his university work, Dr. Scott owns a biotech company called Sporometrics Inc. that develops and provides specialized environmental microbiology diagnostic services. Dr. Scott recently developed MYCOLOGY – The Board Game of Foraging for Fungi, launched on Kickstarter in 2023.
Please join us on Zoom on Wednesday, March 19th at 7:30pm for our online Speaker Series.
Dr. James Scott Mycology: The Board Game of Foraging for Fungi
Mycology: The Board Game of Foraging for Fungi is a strategy-based tabletop game designed by James Scott. This speaker series will provide an introduction to the game, followed by an open Q&A session with Dr. James Scott.
James Scott is a Professor at the University of Toronto specializing in mycology and microbiology. He is the Director of the UAMH Centre for Global Microfungal Biodiversity which operates a large biorepository of living fungi of medical and environmental importance. Much of Dr. Scott’s research focuses on interactions between people and microorganisms, especially fungi, but also algae, protozoa, bacteria, and viruses. His work addresses the detection, taxonomy, ecology and aerobiology of human-associated microbes responsible for infectious, allergic and toxin-mediated disease. Since 2002, he has served as a consultant to the Ontario Poison Centre on mushroom poisonings, and to Dynacare Medical Laboratories on human fungal diseases. In addition to his university work, Dr. Scott owns a biotech company called Sporometrics Inc. that develops and provides specialized environmental microbiology diagnostic services. Dr. Scott recently developed MYCOLOGY – The Board Game of Foraging for Fungi, launched on Kickstarter in 2023.
Olivier Herlin's presentation Plant response to arbuscular mycorrhizal networks differs indoors vs. outdoors is now available to MST members to watch on the meetings video page.
Arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi associate with 70% of plant species and increase the availability of nutrients in exchange for plant sugars. Research determining whether plants benefit from AM fungi is derived predominantly from controlled environments that may not represent the undisturbed field environment. To determine whether plant responses are equivalent between controlled greenhouse and field environments, we quantified 9 plant species responses to severing access to the AM network in both environments using a mesh barrier (48μm) preventing root entry but enabling ingrowth of AM hyphae. We found that in the greenhouse severing access to AM networks reduced plant biomass, but in the field severing increased plant biomass. The lack of correlation in plant mycorrhizal responsiveness between environments suggests that controlled environments may need to account for the surrounding plant density, plant community, and the larger carbon cost from AM networks in the field to observe field relevant plant responses.
Olivier Herlin recently graduated with a Master of Science focusing on the symbiotic interactions with plants and mycorrhizal fungi at the University of Guelph. During the past years Olivier has been working for The Collective Forager, which maintains food forest landscapes and creates managed forest plans within the city of Toronto and Ontario. He has also enjoyed learning and teaching outdoors at various places including Parks Canada, the P.I.N.E. project, and at Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society. Olivier is interested in how humans can be beneficial to their environment and how we can reverse the biodiversity crises occurring on a global scale.
