Soil fungal communities of ectomycorrhizal dominated woodlands across West Africa

Forests and woodlands in the Guineo-Sudanian transition zone contain many tree species that form symbiotic interactions with ectomycorrhizal (ECM) fungi. These fungi facilitate plant growth by increasing nutrient and water uptake and include many fruit body forming fungi, including some edible mushrooms. Despite their importance for ecosystem functioning and anthropogenic use, diversity and distribution of ECM fungi is severely under-documented in West Africa. We conducted a broad regional sampling across five West African countries using soil eDNA to characterize the ECM as well as the total soil fungal community in two vegetation types dominated by ECM host tree species. Sequencing of the entire ITS region and much of the LSU region allows us to infer a phylogeny for all detected soil fungal species.