Occurence and Ecological Significance of Mycorrhizal Symbiosis in Aquatic Plants

Abstract

The mycorrhizal fungi, especially those that are vesicular arbuscular (VA), are universally ubiquitous soil inhabitants, and form symbiotic relationships with roots of land plants from every phylum. This includes members of most families of angiosperms and gymnosperms, together with ferns, lycopods and bryophytes. A fossil record of VA mycorrhizas dates back to the earliest land plants from the Rhynie Chert (Pirozynski and Dalpe 1989), indicating a very long period of co-evolution between plants and these fungal symbionts (Trappe 1987; Morton 1990) through co-accommodation (Brooks 1979). Mycorrhizal fungi link host plants with host soil and their biota in the mycorrhizosphere and play an important role in plant health, productivity and soil structure.