Common Mycorrhizal Network in the Forest Ecosystem

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The amount of fungal biomass in the boreal forest soil is estimated to around 900 kg ha−1 (Wallander et al., 2001). Considering this quantity of fungal mycelia in the soil, it is easily possible that the whole forest ecosystem might be interconnected by a fungal web called common mycorrhizal network (CMN) (Peter, 2006; Lekberg et al., 2010). The simplest CMN structure consists of one or more mycorrhizal fungi that connect at least two plant root systems. Another possibility is when the fungal hyphae fuse togeather and connect the root systems of their host plants. The two main types of CMNs are AM networks typical for grassland ecosystems and agroecosystems (Helgason et al., 1998), which can originate from the mycorrhizal hyphal fuses and EcM networks typical for forest ecosystems (Selosse et al., 2006). An example, which supports the fascinating theory of wood-wide-web, is the study (Beiler et al., 2010) where was shown, that a single tree root system might be linked with 37 other trees by the EcM mycelial connection (Fig. 3). From this point of view might be the whole forest a sing...

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