Plant-microbial mutualisms in canopy gap recovery :
How do soil microbial symbionts help tropical forests recover from treefall gaps?
Plants are ecosystem engineers after disturbance, but rarely act alone as plants often rely on microbial symbionts to acquire essential nutrients for growth.
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Plants are ecosystem engineers after disturbance, but rarely act alone, as plants often rely on microbial symbionts to acquire essential nutrients for growth. But how do soil microbial symbionts with their plant partners help forests recover when large trees fall? To answer this big question, we first need to understand what is disturbance ecology, how treefalls change an ecosystem, how plants and soil microbes work together, and finally how this alters the ecosystem during recovery. This module will explore the role that mutualism plays between plants, bacteria, and fungi in helping tropical forests recover after naturally occurring disturbances such as canopy gaps. We use data from two publicly available datasets derived from a field-based manipulative study examining how environmental factors (light and soil nutrients) affect seedling investment in nitrogen-fixing bacteria and mycorrhizal fungi. We explore ideas about disturbance ecology and the role of humans in changing gap dynamics, while deepening our understanding of how soil microbes influence nutrient and carbon cycling in tropical forests.
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