FungalTraits vs. FUNGuild: Comparison of Ecological Functional Assignments of Leaf- and Needle-Associated Fungi Across 12 Temperate Tree Species

• Benjawan Tanunchai ^{[6] [2]} ; Li Ji ^{[6] [3]} ; Simon Andreas Schroeter ^[1] ; Sara Fareed Mohamed Wahdan ^{[6] [4]} ; Shakhawat Hossen ^{[6] [7]} ; Yoseph Delelegn ^[6] ; François Buscot ^{[6] [5]} ; Ann-Sophie Lehnert ^[1] ; Eliane Gomes Alves ^[1] ; Ines Hilke ^[1] ; Gerd Gleixner ^[1] ; Ernst-Detlef Schulze ^[1] ; Matthias Noll ^{[2] [7]} ; Witoon Purahong ^[6]
  1. [1] Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry

     Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry

     Kreisfreie Stadt Jena, Alemania

     
  2. [2] University of Bayreuth

     University of Bayreuth

     Kreisfreie Stadt Bayreuth, Alemania

     
  3. [3] Northeast Forestry University

     Northeast Forestry University

     China

     
  4. [4] Suez Canal University

     Suez Canal University

     Egipto

     
  5. [5] German Center for Integrative Biodiversity Research

     German Center for Integrative Biodiversity Research

     Kreisfreie Stadt Leipzig, Alemania

     
  6. [6] Department of Soil Ecology, UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Theodor-Lieser-Str. 4, 06120, Halle (Saale), Germany
  7. [7] Institute of Bioanalysis, Coburg University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Coburg, Germany

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• Localización: Microbial ecology, ISSN-e 1432-184X, ISSN 0095-3628, Vol. 85, Nº. 2, 2023, págs. 411-428
• Idioma: inglés
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  • Recently, a new annotation tool “FungalTraits” was created based on the previous FUNGuild and FunFun databases, which has attracted high attention in the scientific community. These databases were widely used to gain more information from fungal sequencing datasets by assigning fungal functional traits. More than 1500 publications so far employed FUNGuild and the aim of this study is to compare this successful database with the recent FungalTraits database. Quality and quantity of the assignment by FUNGuild and FungalTraits to a fungal internal transcribed spacer (ITS)–based amplicon sequencing dataset on amplicon sequence variants (ASVs) were addressed. Sequencing dataset was derived from leaves and needles of 12 temperate broadleaved and coniferous tree species. We found that FungalTraits assigned more functional traits than FUNGuild, and especially the coverage of saprotrophs, plant pathogens, and endophytes was higher while lichenized fungi revealed similar findings. Moreover, ASVs derived from leaves and needles of each tree species were better assigned to all available fungal traits as well as to saprotrophs by FungalTraits compared to FUNGuild in particular for broadleaved tree species. Assigned ASV richness as well as fungal functional community composition was higher and more diverse after analyses with FungalTraits compared to FUNGuild. Moreover, datasets of both databases showed similar effect of environmental factors for saprotrophs but for endophytes, unidentical patterns of significant corresponding factors were obtained. As a conclusion, FungalTraits is superior to FUNGuild in assigning a higher quantity and quality of ASVs as well as a higher frequency of significant correlations with environmental factors.