Publications by authors named "J Geml"
Premise: Southern Africa is a biodiversity hotspot rich in endemic plants and lichen-forming fungi. However, species-level data about lichen photobionts in this region are minimal. We focused on Trebouxia (Chlorophyta), the most common lichen photobiont, to understand how southern African species fit into the global biodiversity of this genus and are distributed across biomes and mycobiont partners.
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- The interaction between a necrotrophic pathogen and grape berries can lead to either noble rot (NR) or grey rot (GR), influenced by climate conditions.
- This study investigates gene expression differences during various rot stages (grey rot, noble rot, and early developing rot) using multidimensional scaling and enrichment analyses.
- Findings show that during the NR phase, grapevines lower their defense responses, indicating a balanced relationship with the pathogen, while the GR phase involves more aggressive plant-pathogen interactions.
Background: High-quality RNA extraction from woody plants is difficult because of the presence of polysaccharides and polyphenolics that bind or co-precipitate with the RNA. The CTAB (cetyl trimethylammonium bromide) based method is widely used for the isolation of nucleic acids from polysaccharide-rich plants. Despite the widespread use of the CTAB method, it is necessary to adapt it to particular plant species, tissues and organs.
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- The study investigates how environmental factors, such as vintage and season, impact the microbial communities associated with grapevines, particularly focusing on the fungal pathobiome.
- Using advanced techniques like metabarcoding and network analysis, researchers analyzed samples from three microhabitats in Hungary’s Tokaj region and identified 123 plant pathogenic genera, noting significant differences in richness and abundance across these areas.
- The findings highlighted that grapevine trunk diseases were more prevalent in wood and bark, while non-GTD pathogens were dominant in soil; seasonal and vintage variations also influenced community composition, with distinct differences observed between healthy and diseased grapevines primarily in wood and bark samples.
Article Synopsis
- The study analyzes soil fungal diversity globally by examining over 4,000 topsoil samples from various ecosystems, revealing how different environmental factors influence fungal communities.
- It demonstrates the effects of temperature and precipitation on local species richness (alpha diversity) and how these factors contribute to variations in fungal composition and evolutionary relationships (beta and phylogenetic diversity).
- The research integrates fungal diversity into global biodiversity frameworks, providing maps and insights that can aid in conservation efforts and ecological studies worldwide.