Papers by Dominik Begerow
IMA Fungus, 2011
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Nectar-dwelling yeast and bacteria are common inhabitants of flowers and evidently involved in po... more Nectar-dwelling yeast and bacteria are common inhabitants of flowers and evidently involved in pollination. The limited number of floral plant-pollinator models studied to date reveal inconsistent conclusions on microbial effects, but coincide with respect to high microbial specificity: while bacteria reduce visitation frequencies of pollinators, nectar-borne specialist yeasts (in contrast to allochthonous or transient species) impose none or even a beneficial effect on flower visitation. However, these findings are in conflict with the strong impact of these predominantly fermenting organisms on the nectar environment. In order to cope with the ultimate dependency of nectar-dwellers on repeated transportation by foragers as a result of early floral senescence, the modifications of nectar associated with specialist growth have been interpreted as adaptations that suit forager’s preferences. But, the development of foraging preferences to either axenic flowers or flowers colonized by...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
IMA Fungus
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Molecular Plant Pathology
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Nature communications, Jan 21, 2018
Convergent adaptation provides unique insights into the predictability of evolution and ultimatel... more Convergent adaptation provides unique insights into the predictability of evolution and ultimately into processes of biological diversification. Supergenes (beneficial gene linkage) are striking examples of adaptation, but little is known about their prevalence or evolution. A recent study on anther-smut fungi documented supergene formation by rearrangements linking two key mating-type loci, controlling pre- and post-mating compatibility. Here further high-quality genome assemblies reveal four additional independent cases of chromosomal rearrangements leading to regions of suppressed recombination linking these mating-type loci in closely related species. Such convergent transitions in genomic architecture of mating-type determination indicate strong selection favoring linkage of mating-type loci into cosegregating supergenes. We find independent evolutionary strata (stepwise recombination suppression) in several species, with extensive rearrangements, gene losses, and transposable ...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Journal of environmental science and health. Part. B, Pesticides, food contaminants, and agricultural wastes, Jan 3, 2017
In this study, the impacts of three different fungicides to fungal phyllosphere communities on br... more In this study, the impacts of three different fungicides to fungal phyllosphere communities on broad bean (Vicia faba, Fabaceae) and common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris, Fabaceae) were analyzed. The fungicides included copper, sulfur, and azoxystrobin. The plants were sowed, grown, and treated under conditions occurring in conventional and organic farming. A culture-based approach was used to identify changes in the phyllosphere fungal community after the treatment. Different effects on species richness and growth index of the epiphytic and endophytic communities for common bean and broad bean could be shown. Treatments with sulfur showed the weakest effect, followed by those based on copper and the systemic azoxystrobin, which showed the strongest effect especially on endophytic communities. The epiphytic fungal community took five weeks to recover after treatment with azoxystrobin. However, the effect of azoxystrobin on the endophytic community lasted more than five weeks. Finally, th...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Mycological Progress, 2017
Multiple anthropogenic stressors have been shown to impact animal and plant communities in freshw... more Multiple anthropogenic stressors have been shown to impact animal and plant communities in freshwater ecosystems, but the responses of aquatic fungi remain largely unknown. Stressor effects on fungal communities may, however, result in changes of decomposition of plant litter and, thus, impact nutrient cycling, a key process for ecosystem functioning. We tested the impact of increased chloride and sediment levels, as well as reduced water flow velocity, on eukaryotic freshwater communities, with an emphasis on fungi, in a mesocosm experiment. Each of the three stressors was applied individually and in all combinations in a full-factorial design. Litterbags with non-sterilised tree leaves and sterile ceramic tiles were added to the mesocosms, to analyse the responses of communities in decaying plant material and in biofilms. Fungi preferably occurring in biofilms were supposed to represent indigenous aquatic fungi, while litterbag communities should be predominantly composed of fungi known from terrestrial litter. Community composition was assessed by high-throughput sequencing of amplified barcoding regions. Similarity matrices of operational taxonomic unit (OTU) tables calculated by UCLUST and CD-HIT-OTU-Illumina were significantly correlated. Preferred occurrence in biofilm and litter communities, respectively, was used for the grouping of OTUs into three ecological guilds. Stressor sensitivity varied among the guilds. While non-fungal, in particular autotrophic, OTUs responded to several treatments, two of the fungal guilds, i.e. those exclusively colonising litter and those preferably occurring on the ceramic tiles, showed no response to any applied treatment. Only fungi preferably, but not exclusively, colonising litter significantly responded to chloride addition. Their distribution patterns again correlated significantly with those of non-fungal OTUs, indicating possible interdependencies between both groups. The results indicate that eukaryotic freshwater communities are composed of different guilds, with distinctive sensitivity and tolerance to anthropogenic stressors.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
ABSTRACT Soil yeasts are distributed globally. They occupy different ecological niches and provid... more ABSTRACT Soil yeasts are distributed globally. They occupy different ecological niches and provide important ecosystem services. Human activities, land management and climate change threats global biodiversity. Recent studies showed that long-term alteration of the native broadleaf vegetation (beech forests) within three UNESCO Biosphere Reserves in Germany substantially changed soil yeast communities [1, 2]. Forest management has little effect on biomass and total abundance values [2, 3] but influenced yeast diversity and community parameters [2]. In addition to the analyses of taxonomic diversity reported in previous studies [1, 2], we assessed phylogenetic diversity of soil yeast communities. Furthermore, we applied MLST approach to assess genetic variation of soil-related Cryptococcus (Tremellomycetes, Agaricomycotina) species and the four following loci were chosen for sequencing: rDNA SSU, LSU and ITS, and RPB1. We isolated a total of 60 yeasts and 20% were new species. Out of these, Cryptococcus terricola, Cr. terreus, Cr. aerius, Cr. podzolicus, Trichosporon dulcitum, T. porosum, Kazachstania piceae, Barnettozyma vustinii, Schwanniomyces castellii and Candida vartiovaarae were the most frequent. We have observed that despite relatively low species richness in a given locality, yeast communities are much more diverse on larger geographic scales. This is mostly due to the fact that nearly half of the species were found in a single site only. Interestingly, yeast species typically showed greater intraspecific variability in regions where they were dominating. Analysis of MLST data showed that the RPB1 gene fragment showed the highest inter- and intraspecific variability in soil-related Cryptococcus species. Remarkably, in several instances the first universal fungal DNA-barcode (ITS, [4]) had a discriminatory power lower than LSU, suggesting that results derived from culture-independent soil surveys, which utilized ITS1 and ITS2 sequences may underestimate diversity of soil yeasts. 1. Yurkov, A.M.; Kemler, M.; Begerow, D. Species accumulation curves and incidence-based species richness estimators to appraise the diversity of cultivable yeasts from beech forest soils. PLoS ONE 6 (2011), e23671. 2. Yurkov, A.M.; Kemler, M.; Begerow, D. Assessment of yeast diversity in soils under different management regimes. Fungal Ecology 5 (2012), 24-35. 3. Birkhofer, K.; Schöning, I.; Alt, F.; Herold, N.; Klarner, B.; et al. General relationships between abiotic soil properties and soil biota across spatial scales and different land-use types. PLoS ONE 7 (2012), e43292. 4. Schoch, C.L.; Seifert, K.A.; Huhndorf, S.; Robert, V.; Spouge, J.L.; Levesque, C.A.; Chen, W.; Fungal Barcoding Consortium. Nuclear ribosomal internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region as a universal DNA barcode marker for Fungi. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science USA 109 (2012), 6241-6246.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
ABSTRACT Yeasts are common inhabitants of floral Angiosperm nectars all around the globe. Althoug... more ABSTRACT Yeasts are common inhabitants of floral Angiosperm nectars all around the globe. Although the functional impact of yeasts on plant-pollinator interactions received no experimental evidence, pollinators are the decisive vectors for yeast dispersal. Moreover, the colonization of nectar by yeasts might be affected by characteristics of floral microsites. To date, available data on yeast species abundance and their physiological properties suggest a narrow group of yeasts adapted to the harsh floral micro-habitats and a group of phylloplane- and soil-related species tolerating these conditions to certain extent. Since pollinating vectors share affectations for different nectariferous and floral traits, the dispersal of yeasts should not be random among closely related plants. In this study we analyzed the floral traits, visitor patterns and nectar yeast communities of three closely related Echium species (Angiospermae, Boraginaceae) from the Canary Islands. We sampled neophytic and herbaceous Echium plantagineum mostly pollinated by the bumblebee Bombus canariensis (Hymenoptera), as well as endemic and woody Echium strictum and Echium leucophaeum, mainly pollinated by Hymenoptera (solitary and honey bees, B. canariensis) or Hymenoptera and birds respectively. We tested if nectar traits (nectar amount and sugar concentration) associated to different pollination systems (pollinators: bumblebees, bees or birds) and their visitation frequencies directly impact the abundance and diversity of yeasts in floral nectar. We found a strong correlation between nectar traits and the occurrence of yeasts. In particular, flowers producing high volumes of nectar with low sugar concentration (bird-pollinated) are characterized by higher yeast counts compared to flowers producing small amounts of sugar-rich nectar (insect pollinated). However, flowers with sugar rich nectars received 10 times more visits compared to flowers with lower sugar concentrations. Our observations suggest that yeast communities in floral nectars are strongly influenced by plant pollination systems. The colonization of floral nectar by yeasts depends only partially on the pollinator visitation frequency. A successful community development in fact seems to be related to nectariferous prerequisites, such as floral nectar traits.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Molecular Ecology, 2015
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Mycological Research, 2004
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Human activities, land management and climate change all have great impact on soil biology, but o... more Human activities, land management and climate change all have great impact on soil biology, but our knowledge on effects on biodiversity of soil organisms is still very limited. Forest management results in declining biodiversity of substrate-dependent taxa like fungi and bryophytes. We hypothesized that land use affects soil yeasts in a similar way to aboveground communities. Therefore, we assessed responses of soil yeasts to land management by studying 57 soils from three distinct localities in Germany, on plots of the Biodiversity Exploratories framework. We studied ancient beech forests, which are listed by UNESCO as the World Heritage, but also forests and grasslands showing different land use. We used cultivation-based techniques with subsequent identification based on rDNA sequence data. Based on experiments using various pre-cultivation sample treatment and different cultivation media we obtained the highest number of yeasts by analyzing mixed soil samples with a single nutr...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Anamorphic stages of Ustilaginomycotina have been isolated from various habitats worldwide. Molec... more Anamorphic stages of Ustilaginomycotina have been isolated from various habitats worldwide. Molecular analyses have clarified phylogenetic relationships and linked the taxa to closely related teleomorphic species. Because the anamorphic species often originate from sources other than host plants of the related parasite groups, their ecology remains unclear. Recent changes in the Code for Nomenclature of Plants, Algae and Fungi require a closer look at the diversity and relationship of anamorphic and teleomorphic species of Basidiomycota, including Ustilaginomycotina. The traditional strategy to use different names for different stages provided several advantages, which we have to consider while implementing the new Code. The parallel use of clearly defined teleomorphic and monophyletic genera on the one hand and large phenotypic asexual genera on the other hand will not be possible in the future and we have to find new ways for species classification. Specifically, a solution for Ps...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Yeasts are common inhabitants of floral Angiosperm nectars all around the globe. Although the fun... more Yeasts are common inhabitants of floral Angiosperm nectars all around the globe. Although the functional impact of yeasts on plant-pollinator interactions received no experimental evidence, pollinators are the decisive vectors for yeast dispersal. Moreover, the colonization of nectar by yeasts might be affected by characteristics of floral microsites. To date, available data on yeast species abundance and their physiological properties suggest a narrow group of yeasts adapted to the harsh floral micro-habitats and a group of phylloplane- and soil-related species tolerating these conditions to certain extent. Since pollinating vectors share affectations for different nectariferous and floral traits, the dispersal of yeasts should not be random among closely related plants. In this study we analyzed the floral traits, visitor patterns and nectar yeast communities of three closely related Echium species (Angiospermae, Boraginaceae) from the Canary Islands. We sampled neophytic and herb...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Mycologia, 1999
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Malassezia and the Skin, 2010
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Uploads
Papers by Dominik Begerow