IMA Fungus 15(1): e34086, doi: 10.1186/s43008-024-00166-5

The contribution of tropical long-term studies to mycology

Jeffery K. Stallman^‡, M. Catherine Aime^§, Rachel A. Koch Bach^‡, Mia Brann^|, Samira Fatemi^¶, Paula Gomez-Zapata^#, Dillon R. Husbands^¤, Blaise Jumbam^«, Patricia J. Kaishian^», Ariana Moffitt^˄, M. Catherine Aime^˅

‡ Purdue University, Department of Botany and Plant Pathology, West Lafayette§ Purdue University, West Lafayette, United States of America| Northern Arizona University, Department of Biology, Flagstaff¶ University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, Pacific Biosciences Research Center, Honolulu# Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Forest Mycology and Plant Pathology, Uppsala Biocenter, Uppsala, Sweden¤ University of Guyana, Department of Agriculture, Greater Georgetown, Guyana« University of Maryland, Department of Plant Science and Landscape Architecture, College Park» New York State Museum, Albany˄ Purdue University, Department of Nutrition Science, West Lafayette˅ Purdue University, Department of Botany & Plant Pathology, West Lafayette

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Citation: Stallman JK, Aime MC, Koch Bach RA, Brann M, Fatemi S, Gomez-Zapata P, Husbands DR, Jumbam B, Kaishian PJ, Moffitt A, Aime MC (2024) The contribution of tropical long-term studies to mycology. IMA Fungus 15(1): e34086. https://doi.org/10.1186/s43008-024-00166-5

Abstract

Fungi are arguably the most diverse eukaryotic kingdom of organisms in terms of number of estimated species, trophic and life history strategies, and their functions in ecosystems. However, our knowledge of fungi is limited due to a distributional bias; the vast majority of available data on fungi have been compiled from non-tropical regions. Far less is known about fungi from tropical regions, with the bulk of these data being temporally limited surveys for fungal species diversity. Long-term studies (LTS), or repeated sampling from the same region over extended periods, are necessary to fully capture the extent of species diversity in a region, but LTS of fungi from tropical regions are almost non-existent. In this paper, we discuss the contributions of LTS of fungi in tropical regions to alpha diversity, ecological and functional diversity, biogeography, hypothesis testing, and conservation—with an emphasis on an ongoing tropical LTS in the Pakaraima Mountains of Guyana. We show how these contributions refine our understanding of Fungi. We also show that public data repositories such as NCBI, IUCN, and iNaturalist contain less information on tropical fungi compared to non-tropical fungi, and that these discrepancies are more pronounced in fungi than in plants and animals.

Keywords

Biodiversity, Biogeography, Citizen science, Conservation, Endemic fungi, Guiana shield, Taxonomy