Underground Explorers

This project is looking at exploring the soil fungal abundance and diversity from bulk and rhizosphere samples at Wits Rural Facility a Lowveld Savannah Ecosystem in Limpopo, South Africa. The ecosystem is economically important to the region for animal and plant biodiversity, supporting ecotourism, farming, dry and wet wood harvesting. Sampling will be conducted following the SPUN sampling protocol on two forest patches of Terminalia sericea (silver cluster) and Dochrostyachys cinerea (sicklebush) and their adjacent open grass patches. The ecosystem is a biodiversity hotspot with the open grassy patches composed of Hyperthelia dissolute, Panicum maximum, Heteropogon contortus and Themeda triandra as the common grasses with few below ground biodiversity studies having carried out in the ecosystem. After DNA extraction, PCR amplification, sequencing will be done on both ITS2 and SSU using Illumina MiSeq platform, to explore the abundance and diversity of fungi with a special interest in arbuscular mycorrhiza in the ecosystem. Scientific impacts of the study will be to give further insight on the top-down effects of fire and encroachment on the ecosystem and its implications to below ground fungal diversity and a significant contribution to global diversity mapping. Social benefits will include the sharing of knowledge about fungi and soil sampling techniques to the local communities and how they can improve their management of the ecosystem for environmentally friendly future sustainability.