Francis M. Martin

An infographic titled “Fungal Tree of Life” depicting a diverse array of fungi with accompanying names and illustrations

Fungi are among the most important and beautiful soil organisms.

🍄 Explore the fungal tree of life, with an emphasis on the macroscopic diversity of fungi.

📷 Laszlo G. Nagy

We need to make #worldsoilday more about the soils of THE WHOLE WORLD.

Across African datasets, there are fewer than 5 mycorrhizal samples per 1 million square kilometers, making the continent 48 times less sampled than Europe.

Today, we celebrate SPUN’s 38 Underground Explorers across Africa 🧵

An interesting study from Japan observes how animal-dispersed truffle-like fungi are more prone to genetic isolation due to forest fragmentation. Not a surprising finding, but interesting to consider from a conservation standpoint!

link.springer.com/article/10.1...

YouTube video by Marcus Wallenberg Prize - MWP MWP Symposium 2025 – Full Broadcast

An array of great speakers, including Steven Strauss, Jerry Tuskan (Prize recipient), Dario Grattapaglia, CJ Tsai and Sanushka Naidoo, speak to the impact of genomic technologies on forest tree improvement programs and the future of forestry.
youtu.be/zIYfSZ1FZLs?...

Photo of a cream coloured lichen with orange, round apothecia. The lichen is growing on rose coloured rock.

A beautiful orange rock posy lichen (Rhizoplaca chrysoleuca) on rose coloured rock. Northwest Territorie, Canada. #lichen #fungi #fungifriends

Big congratulations to our five @umr-iam.bsky.social scientists featuring in the 2025 Global Ranking of the World’s Top 2% Scientists 🏆 prepared by Stanford University:
Aurélie Deveau, @fmartin54.bsky.social, Pascale Frey-Klett, Annegret Kohler and Nicolas Rouhier.
👏👏👏 🍾🥂🎉

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄
Motivated by a seminar from @tomthirkell.bsky.social, I've delved back into my image archives of mycorrhizal fungi in random plant species. This beautifully bunchy fungal arbuscule in a buttercup root needed sharing!🔬🏵️
#mycosky #fungi #microscopy #outreach

The biodiversity, genomics, ecology and evolution of mushroom-forming fungi - Nature Reviews Biodiversity Mushroom-forming fungi have along evolutionary history and a suite of important ecological roles. This Review highlights advances in understanding of Agaricomycetes evolution and ecology driven by gen...

Everything you always wanted to know about mushroom-forming fungi! Great collab with amazing mycologists. Thanks Laszlo Nagy for leading this effort!

www.nature.com/articles/s44...

The first chapter of my dissertation is finally published in @esajournals.bsky.social! We determined which microbial characteristics best explain soil nutrient cycling and their importance compared to plant and soil factors 🍄🌱 doi.org/10.1002/ecs2... @nahpo.bsky.social @k8eatherton.bsky.social

#OurNewPaper in @natrevbiodiv.nature.com 👇

🧪🌾 @cathbell62.bsky.social works @umeauniversitet.bsky.social & @ijpb-versaillescly.bsky.social in France and has been instrumental to establish #INUPRAG, a collaboration between @umeaplantsciencecentre.se, @inrae-france.bsky.social & @cragenomica.bsky.social.

ERC-Plus: jackpot science or missed chance to fix academia? My reflections on ERC-Plus, Europe’s newest ultra-competitive research grant and what it tells us about the academic culture we’re…

I just published: ERC-Plus: jackpot science or missed chance to fix academia?

My reflections on ERC-Plus, Europe’s newest ultra-competitive research grant and what it tells us about the academic culture we’re building.

medium.com/p/erc-plus-j...

The biodiversity, genomics, ecology and evolution of mushroom-forming fungi Nature Reviews Biodiversity, Published online: 02 December 2025; doi:10.1038/s44358-025-00107-zMushroom-forming fungi have along evolutionary history and a suite of important ecological roles. This Review highlights advances in understanding of Agaricomycetes evolution and ecology driven by genomic research.

New online! The biodiversity, genomics, ecology and evolution of mushroom-forming fungi

It was great teaming with such a group of fungal experts 👍

Mapped: The Four Major Types of Forests Around the World Explore the four major types of forests around the world—tropical, boreal, temperate, and subtropical—and how they are managed today.

The faster you warm the climate the more will burn at the same time resulting in a non-linear feedback reaction if warming rate thresholds are breached...

We should be near now...

#climate

Ground plan of a Roman-period wooden building from the vicus (civil settlement) of Eschenz, Switzerland. CREDIT: Amt für Archäologie Thurgau, Schweiz, archaeologie.tg.ch.

The Roman Empire needed wood for building and burning. Tree-ring analysis of over 20,000 samples reveals how Roman expansion drove intensive logging across Central-Western Europe, eventually leading to overexploitation of old-growth forests. In PNAS: https://ow.ly/tWR150XAhVA

The 17 Newsletter is now available:

mycorrhizas.org/wp-content/u...

It includes @YouTube interviews with @mrillig #BeaBock #SmritiPehim (@BalaChaudhary lab).
Tools by #CamilleDelavaux & @ManjuMGupta Top 10 mycorrhizal papers. @ICOM2026 info & more!
Thanks @cesarmarin203 for this 🤗

Our consensus statement led by @jgi.doe.gov on standards for technical reporting in #environmental and host-associated #microbiome studies #STREAMS @norwichmicro.bsky.social @ueaenv.bsky.social

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Endophytes with mycorrhizal potentials: biological and ecological implications Generally, the root mycobiome is dominated by endophytic and mycorrhizal fungi with mutualistic potential to enhance plant fitness. In some cases, however, the distinction between the two biotrophic ...

Endophytes with mycorrhizal potentials: biological and ecological implications

#mycorrhizalpotentials

nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Explore how soil food webs withstand droughts and heatwaves, and what this means for tree regeneration in Swedish forests! 🌲🪱🌳🍄Become a PhD student in the WIFORCE Research School and work with us at SLU-Uppsala @mycopat.bsky.social #climate #forest #microbes #nematodes

www.slu.se/en/about-slu...

Photo Lin Zhang

Profile of Lin Zhang

nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

New preprint from our group led by @metalichen.bsky.social on the discovery of a Starship giant transposable element in the genome of a lichen-forming fungus.

Pourquoi les arbres meurent autant du manque d’eau que des parasites FIGARO DEMAIN - À Champenoux (Meurthe-et-Moselle), les expérimentations sous serre ou à ciel ouvert de l’Inrae viennent nuancer certains postulats concernant l’adaptation de nos forêts à la hausse des...

Pourquoi les 🌳🌲 meurent-ils autant du manque d’💧 que des 🦠🍄🪱 ?

La réponse par @mireiagoga.bsky.social (@umr-iam.bsky.social) dans @lefigaro.fr 👇

#ForestHealth
#ForestPathology

www.lefigaro.fr/sciences/pou...

Three-dimensional genome architecture connects chromatin structure and function in a major wheat pathogen - BMC Biology Background Genome spatial organization plays a fundamental role in biological function across all domains of life. While the principles of nuclear architecture have been well-characterized in animals ...

Our paper on Zymoseptoria tritici 3D genome organization is officially out! @iglavincheska.bsky.social
link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Trois chercheurs d’unités CNRS Écologie & Environnement récompensés par l’Académie des sciences Comme chaque année, l’Académie des sciences remet près de 80 prix couvrant l’ensemble des domaines scientifiques, aussi bien fondamentaux qu’appliqués

#Prix&Distinctions 🏆
Toutes nos félicitations à Frédéric Thomas (UMR Mivegec), Sylvain Gandon (UMR Cefe) et Jonathan Lenoir (UMR Edysan) ! 🥳
www.inee.cnrs.fr/fr/cnrsinfo/...

Champignons : lumière sur un règne encore trop méconnu et aux fascinants pouvoirs Longtemps rapprochés, à tort, des végétaux, les champignons forment un règne extrêmement diversifié dont la majeure partie demeure insoupçonnée. Ces organismes représentent pourtant des modèles passio...

Pour connaître les études faites sur les #champignons @univparissaclay.bsky.social
#fungi
www.universite-paris-saclay.fr/actualites/c...

Results of labeled isotope tracing.

Bark beetle symbioses, nutrients, and decay

Bullington et al. @lorindabee.bsky.social

nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Woodcut illustration to Michael Beuther’s Calendarium Historicum, published in Frankfurt by David Zephelius in 1557. Image shows a person pollarding a tree and another person sowing seeds. CREDIT: The Trustees of the British Museum. Shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) license.

Medieval agricultural and trade practices in southwestern Germany boosted plant diversity for centuries, with biodiversity peaking around 1000 CE and declining only when human activity contracted during the Black Death. In PNAS: https://ow.ly/Q6ca50XxIvC

Peut-on réparer ailleurs la nature détruite ici ? Comment libérer la compensation écologique des influences politiques L’efficacité des mesures de compensation écologique dépend non seulement de leur conception, mais aussi des influences politiques qui les encadrent et parfois les limitent.

Peut-on réparer ailleurs la nature détruite ici ? Comment libérer la compensation écologique des influences politiques

theconversation.com/peut-on-repa...

FLIM analyses of the fungal and plant structures.

An arbuscular mycorrhiza from the 407-million-year-old Windyfield Chert identified through advanced fluorescence and Raman imaging

📖 nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Summary also available in French and Spanish.

@nhm-london.bsky.social #PlantScience