From biomes to genomes: Perspectives on the lichen symbiosis
Symbiosis, the intimate relationship between unrelated organisms, is a widespread complex trait that allows for exploitation of ecological niches and has the potential to drive evolutionary change. The lichen symbiosis is an obligate mutualism of fungi, photosynthesizers, and bacteria, with polyphyl...
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University of Guelph
2023
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ftunivguelph:oai:atrium.lib.uoguelph.ca:10214/27639 2024-06-23T07:52:10+00:00 From biomes to genomes: Perspectives on the lichen symbiosis Drotos, Katherine Gregory, T. Ryan Smith, M. Alex 2023-04-25 application/pdf https://hdl.handle.net/10214/27639 en eng University of Guelph https://hdl.handle.net/10214/27639 Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ genome size lichen nuclear content evolution mycology evolutionary biology fungal evolution species distribution Thesis 2023 ftunivguelph 2024-06-04T23:59:50Z Symbiosis, the intimate relationship between unrelated organisms, is a widespread complex trait that allows for exploitation of ecological niches and has the potential to drive evolutionary change. The lichen symbiosis is an obligate mutualism of fungi, photosynthesizers, and bacteria, with polyphyly of lichenization exhibited by each group. Despite the long history of lichenology, many key features of lichens have only recently been discovered, leading to questions about past assumptions. In addition, lichenology has sometimes lacked comparison with non-lichen-forming fungi in a phylogenetic context. Here, we present a framework through which to examine the complexities of the lichen symbiosis, and then employ the framework to explore two aspects of lichen biology. We evaluated the claim that 8% of the world is covered in lichens and found this was unsubstantiated. We then used a MaxEnt model to predict northern North American occurrence of Cladonia rangiferina to test its viability as a method to estimate global lichen coverage. Our model predicted C. rangiferina could cover 35% of northern North America, demonstrating that MaxEnt may form the starting point for a more integrated model. At the other end of the biological scale, we designed and validated a method to estimate lichen-forming fungal genome size. We then measured the fungal genomes of 25 lichens (23 not currently included in the Fungal Genome Size Database) spanning 2 classes and 10 orders of lichen-forming fungi and 3 independent origins of lichenization, and compared them to non-lichen-forming taxa in a phylogenetic context. We found that all lichens have relatively small genomes for eukaryotes (mean of 0.028 pg), and that they are comparable to their nearest non-lichen-forming relatives. In all, we demonstrate the applicability of employing a multi-perspective framework to the study of complex biological entities, the value of evaluating uncertain claims, and the utility of comparing fundamental traits across phylogeny. Finally, we suggest ... Thesis Cladonia rangiferina University of Guelph: DSpace digital archive |
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Open Polar |
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University of Guelph: DSpace digital archive |
op_collection_id |
ftunivguelph |
language |
English |
topic |
genome size lichen nuclear content evolution mycology evolutionary biology fungal evolution species distribution |
spellingShingle |
genome size lichen nuclear content evolution mycology evolutionary biology fungal evolution species distribution Drotos, Katherine From biomes to genomes: Perspectives on the lichen symbiosis |
topic_facet |
genome size lichen nuclear content evolution mycology evolutionary biology fungal evolution species distribution |
description |
Symbiosis, the intimate relationship between unrelated organisms, is a widespread complex trait that allows for exploitation of ecological niches and has the potential to drive evolutionary change. The lichen symbiosis is an obligate mutualism of fungi, photosynthesizers, and bacteria, with polyphyly of lichenization exhibited by each group. Despite the long history of lichenology, many key features of lichens have only recently been discovered, leading to questions about past assumptions. In addition, lichenology has sometimes lacked comparison with non-lichen-forming fungi in a phylogenetic context. Here, we present a framework through which to examine the complexities of the lichen symbiosis, and then employ the framework to explore two aspects of lichen biology. We evaluated the claim that 8% of the world is covered in lichens and found this was unsubstantiated. We then used a MaxEnt model to predict northern North American occurrence of Cladonia rangiferina to test its viability as a method to estimate global lichen coverage. Our model predicted C. rangiferina could cover 35% of northern North America, demonstrating that MaxEnt may form the starting point for a more integrated model. At the other end of the biological scale, we designed and validated a method to estimate lichen-forming fungal genome size. We then measured the fungal genomes of 25 lichens (23 not currently included in the Fungal Genome Size Database) spanning 2 classes and 10 orders of lichen-forming fungi and 3 independent origins of lichenization, and compared them to non-lichen-forming taxa in a phylogenetic context. We found that all lichens have relatively small genomes for eukaryotes (mean of 0.028 pg), and that they are comparable to their nearest non-lichen-forming relatives. In all, we demonstrate the applicability of employing a multi-perspective framework to the study of complex biological entities, the value of evaluating uncertain claims, and the utility of comparing fundamental traits across phylogeny. Finally, we suggest ... |
author2 |
Gregory, T. Ryan Smith, M. Alex |
format |
Thesis |
author |
Drotos, Katherine |
author_facet |
Drotos, Katherine |
author_sort |
Drotos, Katherine |
title |
From biomes to genomes: Perspectives on the lichen symbiosis |
title_short |
From biomes to genomes: Perspectives on the lichen symbiosis |
title_full |
From biomes to genomes: Perspectives on the lichen symbiosis |
title_fullStr |
From biomes to genomes: Perspectives on the lichen symbiosis |
title_full_unstemmed |
From biomes to genomes: Perspectives on the lichen symbiosis |
title_sort |
from biomes to genomes: perspectives on the lichen symbiosis |
publisher |
University of Guelph |
publishDate |
2023 |
url |
https://hdl.handle.net/10214/27639 |
genre |
Cladonia rangiferina |
genre_facet |
Cladonia rangiferina |
op_relation |
https://hdl.handle.net/10214/27639 |
op_rights |
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ |
_version_ |
1802643412160086016 |