Collaborative Research: Filling the largest void of the fungal genealogy of life (the Pezizomycotina) and integrating symbiotic, environmental and physiological data layers

植物和真菌在自然界中是相互依赖的，通过相互作用对双方都有益（互惠互利，真菌分解死亡的植物材料）或对一方有害（寄生）。因此，如果不在它们的共生相互作用的背景下研究它们，就不能完全理解真菌和植物生物学。随着新的DNA测序技术的出现，越来越清楚的是，已知的10万种真菌只代表自然界中估计的510万种真菌的一小部分。令人惊讶的是，这种未知真菌多样性的最大部分似乎隐藏在植物和地衣的健康叶片中，作为内生真菌和内生真菌。众所周知，内生菌可以保护植物免受病原体的侵害，并增强植物对干旱和高温等非生物胁迫的抵抗力。这些高度多样化的内生和内生真菌大多属于一组丝状子囊菌，称为佩齐菌门。本研究的主要目的是重建Pezizomycotina的系统发育（系谱关系），并将这一进化框架与丰富多样的有机数据集联系起来。这项研究将通过各种拓展活动、高中生参与研究、培训五个州的初级科学家以及开发具有潜在应用的工具来补充，以研究生命科学中物种相互作用的进化。加速发现这些隐藏的真菌也有望为新的药物和生物防治产品提供丰富的二级化合物来源。本研究的目的是填补生命真菌谱系（Pezizomycotina）中最大的系统发育空白，并将不同的数据层与涌现树相结合，作为理解真菌-植物共生的进化、生态学和生理学的手段。培养依赖和独立的方法将产生迄今为止最大的内生真菌和内生真菌样本，目标是陆地、水生和海洋环境中的多种植物、地衣、大型藻类、共生微藻类和蓝藻，重点是生物丰富但研究不足的生物气候带。高效的收集和分析管道将使这些新的共生真菌的系统发育数据能够快速整合到真菌的生命谱系中，而新的生物多样性信息学工具将整合现有的多位点和系统发育框架，并通过下一代测序获得短序列读取。通过对目前未知的生物多样性进行系统采样而丰富的进化树，将在三个数据层（共生系统发育、生态系统发育和生理系统发育）中与宿主和营养谱相结合，从而首次从地理数据、非生物和生物因素以及生理性状中获得新的见解，这些特征使大多数群落赖以生存的植物能够相互作用。

Plants and fungi are interdependently connected in nature, through interactions that are beneficial to both (mutualism, and decomposition of dead plant material by fungi) or detrimental to one partner (parasitism). Therefore, fungal and plant biology cannot be fully understood without studying them within the context of their symbiotic interactions. With the advent of new DNA sequencing technologies, it is becoming clear that the 100,000 known species of fungi represent only a tiny fraction of the estimated 5.1 million species of fungi present in nature. Amazingly, the largest fraction of this unknown fungal diversity seems to be hidden in healthy leaves of plants and lichens, as endophytic and endolichenic fungi. Endophytes are known to protect plants from pathogens, and enhance their resistance to abiotic stresses such as droughts and high temperatures. Most of these hyperdiverse endophytic and endolichenic fungi are classified within a group of filamentous Ascomycota fungi called the Pezizomycotina. The main aims of this research are to reconstruct a phylogeny (genealogical relationships) for the Pezizomycotina and link this evolutionary framework with a rich and diverse set of organismal data. The research will be complemented by diverse outreach activities, engagement of high school students in research, training of junior scientists in five states, and development of tools with potential applications for studying the evolution of species interactions across the life sciences. Accelerating the discovery of these hidden fungi also promises to provide a rich source of secondary compounds for new pharmaceutical and biocontrol products.The objectives of this study are to fill the largest phylogenetic void in the fungal genealogy of life (the Pezizomycotina) and integrate diverse data layers with the emergent tree as a means to understand the evolution, ecology, and physiology of fungal-plant symbioses. Culture-dependent and independent methods will generate the largest sample of endophytic and endolichenic fungi to date, targeting diverse plants, lichens, macroalgae, and co-occurring microalgae and cyanobacteria in terrestrial, aquatic, and marine environments, with a focus on biotically rich but understudied bioclimatic zones. Efficient collecting and analytical pipelines will enable rapid integration of phylogenetic data from these new symbiotic fungi into the fungal genealogy of life, while novel biodiversity informatics tools will integrate existing multi-locus and phylogenomic frameworks with short sequence reads obtained with next-generation sequencing. Resulting evolutionary trees, greatly enriched by systematic sampling of currently unknown biodiversity, will be integrated with host and trophic spectra in three data layers (symbio-phylogenetic, eco-phylogenetic, and physio-phylogenetic), enabling for the first time novel insights from geographic data, abiotic and biotic factors, and the physiological traits that enable mutualistic interactions with plants on which most communities depend.