Landscape effects on global soil pathogenic fungal diversity across spatial scales

Growing evidence has shown that, apart from local environmental factors, changes in landscape-level factors by accelerated land-use change can also shape soil pathogenic fungal diversity. However, the global representativeness of such patterns remains unclear. Here, we assess how pathogenic fungal diversity in 511 soil samples worldwide responds to landscape factors, including landscape complexity index based on eight landscape metrics and quantity of different land cover types across six spatial scales (i.e., surrounding landscape, 250 m to 10,000 m radii from the sampling coordinate). We find that while soil variables explain over half of the variance, pathogenic fungal alpha diversity increases with landscape complexity and crop cover proportion, but decreases with grass and tree cover proportion, together explaining 23.4% of the total variance. Landscape factors have weaker impacts on beta diversity, explaining 13.0% of the variance. Across spatial scales, grassland ecosystems exhibit increasingly stronger responses to landscape variables compared to forest ecosystems. Landscape factors have a higher relative contribution to root-associated fungi than leaf/fruit/seed-associated fungi. Our results emphasize the importance of local factors and the complementary role of landscape patterns in shaping global soil pathogenic fungal distributions, highlighting scale-dependent effects across ecosystems and fungal functional groups.

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Journal
Nature Communications
Published
2026-01-09
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-67929-5
Primary Topic
Mycorrhizal Fungi and Plant Interactions
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article
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article

Landscape effects on global soil pathogenic fungal diversity across spatial scales

Qicheng Bei, Anja Schmidt, Henning Meesenburg, Alain Paquette et al.
Nature Communications
Mycorrhizal Fungi and Plant Interactions
article

Landscape effects on global soil pathogenic fungal diversity across spatial scales

Qicheng Bei, Anja Schmidt, Henning Meesenburg, Alain Paquette, Luciano Di Martino, Guillaume Patoine, Florence Maunoury‐Danger, Marcello Tomaselli, Jeyanny Vijayanathan, Helena Cristina Serrano, Andrijana Andrić, Artur Stefański, Dušanka Vujanović, Martin Freitag, Michele Carbognani, William C. Parker, Zsolt Kotroczó, Kate Lajtha, Hiroko Kurokawa, Michael Danger, Milan K. Barna, Martin Schädler, Christine Delire, Tsutomu Enoki, Mihai Puşcaş, Liesbeth van den Brink, Matthias C. Rillig, Arne Verstraeten, Beat Frey, Kaie Kriiska, Kazuhiko Hoshizaki, Simon Drollinger, Martin Weih, Rodrigo Martins, Zoltán Tóth, Cristina Branquinho, Adriano Caliman, Aurora Gaxiola, Elisabeth Hornung, Vincent Maire, István Fekete, Tsutom Hiura, Ivika Ostonen, Karibu Fukuzawa, François Buscot, Petra Fransson, Markus Wagner, E. Carol Adair, Pablo Luis Peri, Valter Di Cecco, Carlos A. Guerra, Roberto Cazzolla Gatti, Stefan Löfgren, Julia Seeber, Megan J. Kelly-Slatten, Heinke Jäger, Peter Haase, Ying Chen, Anderson da R. Gripp, Helge Bruelheide, Ana Carolina Peixoto Sousa, Quentin Ponette, Markus Didion, Peter B. Reich, John Loehr, Ika Djukic, Rebecca Mast, Mark Frenzel, Ademir S. F. Araujo, Marcus Schaub, Tudor M. Ursu, Rafaella Canessa, Xiang Liu, Carl-Eric Wegner, Ute Hamer, Juan J. Jiménez, Stefan Trogisch, Evgeny A. Davydov, Franz Zehetner, Kirsten Küsel, Chiling Chen, Corinna Rebmann, Pavel Dan Turtureanu, Casper T. Christiansen, Anna Heintz-Buschart, Takuo Hishi, Grizelle González, Georg Wohlfahrt, Marie-Anne de Graaff, Petr Petřík, Maria Glushkova, Inara Melece, Victoria Ochoa, Yawen Lu, Sebastian Kepfer-Rojas, Susanna E. Venn, Fernando T. Maestre, Stefan Scheu
article en

Abstract

Growing evidence has shown that, apart from local environmental factors, changes in landscape-level factors by accelerated land-use change can also shape soil pathogenic fungal diversity. However, the global representativeness of such patterns remains unclear. Here, we assess how pathogenic fungal diversity in 511 soil samples worldwide responds to landscape factors, including landscape complexity index based on eight landscape metrics and quantity of different land cover types across six spatial scales (i.e., surrounding landscape, 250 m to 10,000 m radii from the sampling coordinate). We find that while soil variables explain over half of the variance, pathogenic fungal alpha diversity increases with landscape complexity and crop cover proportion, but decreases with grass and tree cover proportion, together explaining 23.4% of the total variance. Landscape factors have weaker impacts on beta diversity, explaining 13.0% of the variance. Across spatial scales, grassland ecosystems exhibit increasingly stronger responses to landscape variables compared to forest ecosystems. Landscape factors have a higher relative contribution to root-associated fungi than leaf/fruit/seed-associated fungi. Our results emphasize the importance of local factors and the complementary role of landscape patterns in shaping global soil pathogenic fungal distributions, highlighting scale-dependent effects across ecosystems and fungal functional groups.

Nature CommunicationsVol. 17(1)
University of Vermont (US), Boise State University (US), Universidad Complutense de Madrid (ES), Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (BR), University of Copenhagen (DK), University of Parma (IT), Charles Darwin Foundation (EC), Magyar Agrár- és Élettudományi Egyetem (HU), Forest Research Institute Malaysia (MY), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR), University of Minnesota (US), Oregon State University (US), Eurac Research (IT), Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry (CA), Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (US), University of Helsinki (FI), Kyushu University (JP), Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (DE), Deakin University (AU), Université du Québec à Montréal (CA), University of New Hampshire (US), Philipps University of Marburg (DE), Altai State University (RU), University of Novi Sad (RS), University of Concepción (CL), Universität Innsbruck (AT), University of Wisconsin–Stevens Point (US), Universidad de Jaén (ES), Peking University (CN), Research Institute for Nature and Forest (BE), Hokkaido University (JP), Czech University of Life Sciences Prague (CZ), Ontario Forest Research Institute (CA), Slovak Academy of Sciences (SK), Kyoto University (JP), University of Münster (DE), Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (BG), University of Michigan (US), Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (CH), German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (DE), Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum Frankfurt/M (DE), Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SE), Suzhou University of Science and Technology (CN), Universidade Federal do Piauí (BR), Babeș-Bolyai University (RO), National University of Austral Patagonia (AR), Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte (BR), Institute of Forest Ecology of the Slovak Academy of Sciences (SK), Sustainability Institute (ZA), MIT University (MK), Institute of Botany of the Slovak Academy of Sciences (SK), Institute for Biodiversity (DE), Institute of Ecology and Biodiversity (CL), General Electric (Austria) (AT), Météo-France (FR), National Institute of Research and Development for Biological Sciences (RO), Berlin Brandenburg Institute of Advanced Biodiversity Research (DE), Instituto Pirenaico de Ecología (ES), International Institute of Tropical Forestry (PR), Czech Academy of Sciences, Institute of Botany (CZ), Institute for Soil Sciences (HU), Taiwan Agricultural Research Institute Council of Agriculture, Executive Yuan (TW), University of Veterinary Medicine (HU), University of Nyíregyháza (HU), Nordwestdeutsche Forstliche Versuchsanstalt (DE), Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire des Environnements Continentaux (FR), HUN-REN Centre for Agricultural Research (HU), BioSense Institute (RS), Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (DE), Akita Prefectural University (JP), University of Tartu (EE), University of Aveiro (PT), University of Duisburg-Essen (DE), Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (CA), Western Sydney University (AU), Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (DE), King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (SA), University of Göttingen (DE), The University of Tokyo (JP), Freie Universität Berlin (DE), Friedrich Schiller University Jena (DE), Lanzhou University (CN), University of Coimbra (PT), University of Tübingen (DE), RMIT University (AU), University of Amsterdam (NL), Université de Lorraine (FR), University of Latvia (LV), Leipzig University (DE), BOKU University (AT), University of Bologna (IT), UCLouvain (BE)
National Science Foundation, Institut Català de Nanociència i Nanotecnologia, Dipartimenti di Eccellenza, Ministerul Cercetării, Inovării şi Digitalizării, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, Svenska Forskningsrådet Formas, Eesti Teadusagentuur, Austrian Science Fund, Ministero dell’Istruzione, dell’Università e della Ricerca, Ministry of Environment, Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Akademie Věd České Republiky, Vetenskapsrådet, China Scholarship Council, Helmholtz-Zentrum für Umweltforschung, Vedecká Grantová Agentúra MŠVVaŠ SR a SAV, Fundación Charles Darwin, Service Public de Wallonie, Deutsches Zentrum für integrative Biodiversitätsforschung Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Agencia Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo, Horizon 2020 Framework Programme, Centro de Estudos Ambientais e Marinhos, Universidade de Aveiro, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia
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