Characteristics of fungal communities in the regions Tricholoma matsutake inhabits

Tricholoma matsutake is an ectomycorrhiza which has symbiotic relationships with the root of Pinus densiflora. A fruiting body of T. matsutake has the unique flavor and is one of the most popular foods in Northeast Asia. Especially, the microbial communities have great effects on the growth of T. matsutake, but there are few researches on the diversity of these communities. The ECM included T. matsutake is the major group of mycorrhizae and effects greatly on plant growth by colonizing near the rootlets of living plants. In this study, soil fungal communities from three regions (Gyeongju, Pohang and Yeongdeok) were analyzed using the barcoded pyrosequencing method to determine the difference of fungal communities between the areas where T. matsutake fruiting body exists and where do not exist. We analyzed fungal species richness, fungal diversity and taxonomic composition of the soil samples from Gyeongju, Pohang and Yeongdeok. In total, the number of valid reads after preprocessing was 73,407 from six of different regions. The taxonomic composition analyses indicated that the phylum Mucorales was the most abundant in Gyeongju; In Pohang, the phylum Ascomycota in PH1 and the phylum Basidiomycota in PH2 were the most abundant; In Yeongdeok, the most abundant phyla were Ascomycota in YD1, Basdidiomycota in YD2. The diversity was higher in the regions where fruiting bodies of T. matsutake were not found than in the regions where they were found. This study provides a basis for understanding the ecological interactions between T. matsutake and other microorganisms.