Saprotrophic fungal community responses to nitrogen additions in a Korean pine plantation: insights from using the mycoindicator

Abstract

Human activities contribute to elevated nitrogen input in terrestrial ecosystems, influencing the composition of soil nutrients and microbial diversity in forest ecosystems. In this study, we built four addition treatments (0, 20, 40, and 80 kg ha−1 a−1 N for 6 a) at a Korean pine plantation of different soil horizons (organic (O) horizon, ranging from 0 to 10 cm, and organomineral (A) horizon, extending from 10 to 20 cm) to evaluate responses of the structure of saprophytic fungal communities. Here, 80 kg ha−1 a−1 N treatment significantly decreased the community richness in soil A horizon with the Chao1 index decreasing by 12.68%. Nitrogen addition induced changes in the composition of saprophytic fungi community between the different soil horizons. The co-occurrence network and its associated topological structure were utilized to identify mycoindicators for specific fungi to both soil horizons and nitrogen addition levels. In soil O horizon, the mycoindicators included Penicillium, Trichoderma, Aspergillus, and Pseudeurotium across control, low, medium, and high nitrogen treatments. In soil A horizon, Geomyces, Cladophialophora, Penicillium, and Pseudeurotium were identified as mycoindicators. Structural equation modeling determined NH4+-N as the key factor driving changes in saprotrophic fungal communities. Our study aimed to screen mycoindicators that can respond to the increasing global nitrogen deposition and to assess the roles of these mycoindicators in the saprophytic fungal community structure within Korean pine plantations in northeast China.