Journal article

Publication year: 2024

Pages: 44-58

Journal: Mycologia

Volume number: 116

Issue number: 1

ISSN: 0027-5514

eISSN: 1557-2536

Open access status: Hybrid

DOI Link: https://doi.org/10.1080/00275514.2023.2263148

Publisher: Taylor and Francis Group

Abstract: 
Over the decades our understanding of lichens has shifted to the fact that they are multiorganismic, symbiotic microecosystems, with their complex interactions coming to the fore due to recent advances in microbiomics. Here, we present a mutualistic-parasitic continuum dynamics scenario between an orange lichen and a lichenicolous fungus from the Atacama Desert leading to the decay of the lichen's photobiont and leaving behind a black lichen thallus. Based on isolation, sequencing, and ecophysiological approaches including metabolic screenings of the symbionts, we depict consequences upon infection with the lichenicolous fungus. This spans from a loss of the lichen's photosynthetic activity and an increased roughness of its surface to an inhibition of the parietin synthesis as a shared pathway between the photobiont and the mycobiont, including a shift of secondary metabolism products. This degree of relations has rarely been documented before, although lichenicolous fungi have been studied for over 200 years, adding an additional level to the view of interactions within lichens.

Harvard Citation style: Jung, P., Baumann, K., Emrich, D., Schermer, M., Eckhardt, K., Jandl, G., et al. (2024) The dark side of orange: Multiorganismic continuum dynamics within a lichen of the Atacama Desert, Mycologia, 116(1), pp. 44-58. https://doi.org/10.1080/00275514.2023.2263148

APA Citation style: Jung, P., Baumann, K., Emrich, D., Schermer, M., Eckhardt, K., Jandl, G., Leinweber, P., Harion, F., Wruck, A., Grube, M., Buedel, B., & Lakatos, M. (2024). The dark side of orange: Multiorganismic continuum dynamics within a lichen of the Atacama Desert. Mycologia. 116(1), 44-58. https://doi.org/10.1080/00275514.2023.2263148