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What is the significance of the arbuscular mycorrhizal colonisation of many economically important crop plants?

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Abstract

Arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) symbioses are widespread in land plants but the extent to which they are functionally important in agriculture remains unclear, despite much previous research. We ask focused questions designed to give new perspectives on AM function, some based on recent research that is overturning past beliefs. We address factors that determine growth responses (from positive to negative) in AM plants, the extent to which AM plants that lack positive responses benefit in terms of nutrient (particularly phosphate: P) uptake, whether or not AM and nonmycorrhizal (NM) plants acquire different forms of soil P, and the cause(s) of AM ‘growth depressions’. We consider the relevance of laboratory work to the agricultural context, including effects of high (available) soil P on AM fungal colonisation and whether AM colonisation may be deleterious to crop production due to fungal ‘parasitism’. We emphasise the imperative for research that is aimed at increasing benefits of AM symbioses in the field at a time of increasing prices of P-fertiliser, and increasing demands on agriculture to feed the world. In other words, AM symbioses have key roles in providing ecosystem services that are receiving increasing attention worldwide.

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Abbreviations

AM:

arbuscular mycorrhizal

NM:

non-mycorrhizal

MGR:

mycorrhizal growth response

MGD:

mycorrhizal growth dependency

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Acknowledgements

In this review we have covered a lot of ground, and we acknowledge that there is much important research that for reasons of space we cannot cite. We owe many apologies but hope that publications that we have cited show reasonable balance. It is a pleasure to acknowledge the outstanding contributions made by our friend Iver Jakobsen, who has collaborated with Lynette Abbott and Alan Robson, and from whom we have subsequently learned a lot. We also thank Brent Kaiser for helpful comments on this manuscript. Our own research was supported by the Australian Research Council, the South Australia Grain Industry Trust, and the Waite Research Institute. Last and by no means least, we thank members of the mycorrhiza group at the University of Adelaide for their many contributions to the research and ideas presented here.

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  1. Soils Group, School of Agriculture, Food and Wine, Waite Campus, the University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia, 5005

    F. Andrew Smith & Sally E. Smith

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  1. F. Andrew Smith
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Smith, F.A., Smith, S.E. What is the significance of the arbuscular mycorrhizal colonisation of many economically important crop plants?. Plant Soil 348, 63–79 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-011-0865-0

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