Circumglobal study of fungal endophyte diversity in the boreal biome

Although the global diversity of fungi is estimated to far exceed 1,500,000 species, mycologists have described only ca. 100,000 species so far. The disparity largely reflects an immense but invisible richness that is hidden within other organisms through symbiosis. One of the planet’s most prevalent but least-understood symbioses: that of endophytic fungi (endophytes), which occur within healthy above-ground tissues of all plants (and in lichens as endolichenic fungi) in biomes ranging from tropical rainforests to Arctic tundra. The goal of this project is to evaluate and describe the diversity of endophytes at multiple spatial and phylogenetic scales around the circumboreal belt.