Collaborative research: Evolutionary trade-offs in the adaptation of decomposers to global warming: Implications for ecosystem C balance

负责碳的腐烂和循环的土壤真菌可能会随着全球变暖而进化。这可能会对全球变化产生严重后果。这组研究人员假设，较温暖的温度可能有利于真菌的进化，这些真菌可以分解长寿(顽固的？)物质。在土壤里。其结果是，更多的温室气体将在反馈循环中释放到大气中，这可能会导致气温更高。这个问题在阿拉斯加北部的北方森林中尤为紧迫，这些森林在土壤中储存了大量顽固的物质，而且变暖的速度比其他地方更快。研究小组成员将在这些森林中模拟全球变暖，并检查其对真菌及其降解活动的影响。此外，他们还将在实验室实验中让真菌暴露在变暖的环境中，这些实验将使用遗传和生理测试来检查它们分解顽固物质的能力是如何随着时间的推移而变化的。没有真菌来分解有机物，人类生命就不能存在，因为它们从死亡的有机体中循环营养物质，供植物、动物和人类使用。这项研究将对全球变暖可能影响真菌的不同方式提供明确的预测。这也将是第一批研究这些微生物在应对全球变暖时的进化情况的实验室之一。此外，调查人员将培训一名博士后研究员、两名研究生和几名本科生研究人员，重点是从科学领域代表性不足的群体中招收学生。调查人员还将邀请附近一所小学的学生和老师参加为期一天的蘑菇探险和全球变化实地考察。

Soil fungi responsible for the decay and recycling of carbon may evolve in response to global warming. This could have serious consequences with respect to global change. This team of investigators posit that warmer temperatures may favor the evolution of fungi that can break down material that is long-lived(?recalcitrant?) in the soil . As a consequence, more greenhouse gases would be released to the atmosphere in a feedback loop that could lead to even warmer temperatures. This issue is particularly urgent in the northern, boreal forests of Alaska, which store large amounts of recalcitrant matter in their soils, and which are warming more rapidly than elsewhere. Research team members will be simulating global warming in such forests and examining its effects on fungi and their degradation activities. In addition, they will be exposing fungi to warming in laboratory experiments that will use genetic and physiological tests to examine how their ability to decompose recalcitrant materials changes over time.Human life cannot exist without fungi to decompose organic matter, since they recycle nutrients from dead organisms for use by plants, animals, and people. This study will provide explicit predictions of the different ways that global warming maybe affecting fungi. It will also be one of the first to examine the evolution of these microbes in response to global warming. In addition, the investigators will train one postdoctoral researcher, two graduate students and several undergraduate researchers, with an emphasis on recruitment of students from underrepresented groups in science. The investigators will also invite students and teachers from a nearby elementary school to participate in day-long mushroom forays and a global change field trip.