Operational Support for the International Collection of VA Mycorrhizal Fungi

囊状丛枝菌根真菌在自然界中普遍存在，实验表明，它可以减轻植物胁迫，促进植物间营养物质的转移，提高土壤稳定性，提高植物激素水平，提高植物对土壤中元素的吸收。由于这些特性，全世界科学界对这些真菌产生了相当大的兴趣，对可靠的VA菌根真菌培养的需求也随之增加。由于它们是专性共生真菌，不能在培养基上维持，因此不能从现有的微生物集合中获得培养物。1985年10月，美国国家科学基金会向食品和农业科学研究所提供了一笔赠款，用于建立这些真菌的培养收藏。目前已收集到VA菌根真菌6属56种548株。在其运作的头两年，向92名研究人员发送了300多个培养物。该项目为今后15个月的收集工作提供部分业务资金。

Vesicular-arbuscular (VA) mycorrhizal fungi are ubiquitous in nature and have been shown experimentally to reduce plant stress, to enable interplant transfer of nutrients, and to increase soil stability, plant phytohormone levels, and plant absorption of elements in soil. Because of these attributes, there has been considerable world-wide interest in these fungi among the scientific community and an increased demand for reliable cultures of VA mycorrhizal fungi has resulted. Since they are obligate symbiotic fungi which cannot be maintained on culture media, cultures can not be obtained from existing microbial collections. In October of 1985, NSF awarded a grant to the Institute of Food and Agriculture Sciences to establish a culture collection of these fungi. This collection presently consists of 548 isolates of 56 species among the six genera of VA mycorrhizal fungi. In the first two years of its operation, over 300 cultures were sent to 92 researchers. This project provides partial operational funding for the collection for the next 15 months.