Center for Biomolecular Structure Lecture Series

Forest ecosystems, encompassing 30% of the Earth's land area, possess significant C storage capabilities, regulate and store ~50 billion tons of soil organic matter. Its capacity makes forest as vital players in climate change mitigation.Over millions of years, forest trees and their symbiotic partners, such as the key stone symbiotic fungi Suillus, have co-evolved intricate mechanisms to support each other in nutrient acquisition and adaptation to dynamic environments, including biotic and abiotic stresses. Using Pinus and Suillus as a model, our research aims at unveiling the communication and regulation mechanisms employed by plants and their symbionts, facilitating nutrient flux and adaptation to evolving environments. Our investigative tools include metagenomic, metatranscriptomic, metaproteomic, and metabolomic analyses, coupled with biogeochemical and chemical imaging approaches. This presentation provides an overview of our ongoing projects examining Pinus-Suillus-soil interactions and their consequences on nutrient allocation and stress environment adaptation. We will emphasize the application of X-ray imaging technology in elucidating these intricate mechanisms.