I experience the same as Editor, but also so many Review requests per week, it´s crazy. Just too many submissions are flooding the system. There could be a solution, when every author holding a PhD would have to review for Journals they got articles accepted. Fair distribution of the work?

The peer-review crisis: how to fix an overloaded system Journals and funders are trying to boost the speed and effectiveness of review processes that are under strain.

As a writer, teacher, AE, and reviewer, i share lots of their views. We need to work together to improve the system.
The peer-review crisis: how to fix an overloaded system www.nature.com/articles/d41...

With a new fungal isolate collection derived from specialized carbon media, we developed the FungiResp approach for soil fungal carbon use trait characterization. Phylogenetic trait imputation allowed to characterize functional shifts of soil fungal communities in response to substrate availability

Many common fungi sequenced in agricultural soils showed surprisingly limited activity on complex carbon sources like cellulose and starch. Complex carbon use ability was an important trait differentiating fungal isolates, predicting functional community shifts in soil.

What are all these soil fungi doing? Complex carbon use ability as a predictive trait for fungal community functions Fungal communities in soil play important roles in decomposition processes and soil organic carbon cycling. These communities are tremendously diverse, making it challenging to assign relevant functio...

Happy to share this big piece on saprobic fungal traits and soil carbon cycling. Great collaboration in the SPP SoilSystems @dfg.de , with Damien Finn, Sören Thiele-Bruhn, Denise Vonhoegen, @mrillig.bsky.social and many others contributing to the study. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Looks like a very useful tool, congrats to the group of Fernanda Pinheiro. A parallel R package would be nice :)

Systematic pairwise co-cultures uncover predominant negative interactions among human gut bacteria - Microbiome Background Understanding pairwise bacterial interactions in the human gut is crucial for deciphering the complex networks of bacterial interactions and their contributions to host health. However, the...

Systematic pairwise co-cultures uncover predominant negative interactions among human gut bacteria

-in BMC Microbiome

microbiomejournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....

Cross-kingdom comparative genomics reveal the metabolic potential of fungi for lignin turnover in deadwood - Nature Ecology & Evolution This study uses comparative genomics and phylogenetics to analyse the distribution and evolution of key enzymes involved in the catabolism of lignin-related aromatic compounds in the bacterial and fun...

This is awesome work on fungal lignin breakdown. And I like this "simplified" overview graph of lignin breakdown. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

📢✨ONLINE FIRST!✨

How do anthropogenic drivers influence @soilbiodiversity change? Find out here!

@bartoszbartk.com @eisenhauerlab.bsky.social @mrillig.bsky.social @christianristok.bsky.social @doreenbabin.bsky.social Jörg Römbke, Frank Galante, Christina Lachman

soil-organisms.org/index.php/SO...

Depiction of growth system categorization and network criteria used in this study.

Systematic mapping of experimental approaches to studying common #mycorrhizal networks in arbuscular mycorrhiza

#Review by Anika Lehmann and @mrillig.bsky.social

📖 nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

#LatestIssue

From glomalin to glomalose: unraveling the molecular identity of the MAb32B11 antigen Glomalin, a substance produced by arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi, has well-documented benefits for plant and soil health, including water retention and soil aggregation. Glomalin quantification h...

Alptekin et al. suggest glomalin is a carbohydrate - glomalose. I wonder how this is different from EPS?
nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Raunkiæran shortfalls: Challenges and perspectives in trait‐based ecology Trait-based ecology, a prominent research field identifying traits linked to the distribution and interactions of organisms and their impact on ecosystem functioning, has flourished in the last three....

The Raunkiæran shortfalls to trait ecology. Great read on the limitations of trait concepts, and solutions. Led by Francesco de Bello
esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

What does colonisation tell us? Revisiting the functional outcomes of root colonisation by arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi Click on the article title to read more.

Very important topic on the functional significance of AM root colonization
nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Postdoktor i utveckling av Ramanspektroskopi av jordmikrober Särskild ämnesbeskrivning Jordmånen är grunden för vårt samhälle och vår livsmedelssäkerhet, men den är fortfarande en av de sista domänerna i vårt moderna liv som teknologiseras. Jordmikr

Exciting postdoc opportunity with Milda Pucetaite and us in the Soilchip group: Become the spectroscopy expert in our multimodal fungal recognition project within our interdisciplinary VR research environment:) lu.varbi.com/what:job/job...

And congratulations to Yongxing Cui to this global analysis of microbial nutrient limitations, just published in @pnas.org Thank you for the fun collaboration

Constituent of extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) produced by a range of soil bacteria and fungi - BMC Microbiology Extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) produced by soil bacteria and fungi are crucial for microbial growth and provide many functions for the soil and its microbes. EPS composition may depend on mi...

In case somebody is still here, getting really quiet in blue skies..
There is some new research on EPS production under different resource conditions in bacteria and fungi, led by Rebeca Leme Oliva. Great collaboration with Rainer Joergensen bmcmicrobiol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....

Wind Patterns Influence the Dispersal and Assembly of North American Soil Fungal Communities Wind is the primary vector of fungal spore dispersal. We document that windflow patterns, both the direction and magnitude, exhibit a significant influence on the composition and diversity of soil fu....

Wind dispersal shapes fungal communities, especially mushroom forming species. Nice study design by Peter Pellitier and @mykophile.bsky.social ‬ onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Fungal cell wall biogenesis: structural complexity, regulation and inhibition The cell wall is the defining organelle of filamentous and yeast-like fungi. It is responsible for morphology, biotic and abiotic interactions and its…

When thinking about soil microbial necromass composition and biomarker significance, having good knowledge of microbial cell wall composition is crucial.
Another great review on the fungal cell wall by Neil Gow
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

The AmazonFACE project is offering post doc scholarships, based in Manaus, Brazil!

Fungal mycelia are finally getting the spotlight they deserve! And how could they not? Their morphology is just stunning! We tracked our friend Absidia sp. forming this intricate exploratory mycelium, showcasing unique elongation and branching patterns #fungi #mycelium #networks

Integrating ecological and evolutionary frameworks for SynCom success Use of synthetic microbial communities (SynComs) is a promising approach that harnesses nature-based solutions to support soil fertility and food security, mitigate climate change impacts, and restor...

Nice take on SynComms by Delgado-Baquerizo et al.
nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Interesting proposal to classify ectomycorrhizal fungi along a continuum from miners to absorbers. 👇🍄 An inspiring read, so much potential for studies testing this trait spectrum! 🤓 🧪🌍

So true

Contrasting common measures of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal root colonization Estimating the abundance of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi relies entirely on indirect methods, meaning all measures are associated with some variabilit…

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Should we all be evaluating how we can better measure AM fungal colonisation?

It should be very informative right? But is it? Probably depends what you're after.

How well does it predict plant outcomes?

A researcher on a boardwalk in a DANK hawaiian forest on Molokai.

RP PLS! Iʻm hiring 3 postdocs at U Hawaiʻi to study yeast diversity and evolution, marine fungi, and the genomics of microbiomes in experimental foodwebs. All of these projects have existing datasets and LATITUDE to pursue individual interests and "blue sky" ideas www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/5d7u4...

I proudly present a new review paper of my group that just came out in Trends in Microbiology @cp-trendsmicrobiol.bsky.social
with Leonardo Ona and Shryli Shreekar

Disentangling microbial interaction networks

Open access link:
authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S...

Such an amazing study 👍

Phages Affect Soil Dissolved Organic Matter Mineralization by Shaping Bacterial Communities Viruses are considered to regulate bacterial communities and terrestrial nutrient cycling, yet their effects on bacterial metabolism and the mechanisms of carbon (C) dynamics during dissolved organic matter (DOM) mineralization remain unknown. Here, we added active and inactive bacteriophages (phages) to soil DOM with original bacterial communities and incubated them at 18 or 23 °C for 35 days. Phages initially (1–4 days) reduced CO2 efflux rate by 13-21% at 18 °C and 3–30% at 23 °C but significantly (p < 0.05) increased by 4–29% at 18 °C and 9–41% at 23 °C after 6 days, raising cumulative CO2 emissions by 14% at 18 °C and 21% at 23 °C. Phages decreased dominant bacterial taxa and increased bacterial community diversity (consistent with a “cull-the-winner” dynamic), thus altering the predicted microbiome functions. Specifically, phages enriched some taxa (such as Pseudomonas, Anaerocolumna, and Caulobacter) involved in degrading complex compounds and consequently promoted functions related to C cycling. Higher temperature facilitated phage-bacteria interactions, increased bacterial diversity, and enzyme activities, boosting DOM mineralization by 16%. Collectively, phages impact soil DOM mineralization by shifting microbial communities and functions, with moderate temperature changes modulating the magnitude of these processes but not qualitatively altering their behavior.

New paper out with collaborators Tida Ge, Shuang Wang and others: Phages Affect Soil Dissolved Organic Matter Mineralization by Shaping Bacterial Communities doi.org/10.1021/acs....

Dynamics of bacterial growth, and life-history tradeoffs, explain differences in soil carbon cycling due to land-use Abstract. Soil contains a considerable fraction of Earth’s organic carbon. Bacterial growth and mortality drive the microbial carbon pump, influencing carb

Interesting paper. This inference stood out for me:

"Result suggests a fitness paradox whereby some bacteria can optimize fitness in soil by minimizing mortality rather than maximizing growth."

academic.oup.com/ismecommun/a...

Such nice examples of creative processes in science. And a fun podcast 👍