I love soil fungi! And am lucky enough to be able to work with these creatures and explain the world how important fungi are for functioning of ecosystems. My main focus is on how soil fungal communities regulate plant communities and interact with so many other organisms indirectly or directly,
Currently
Blog posts related to current project
Heinen, R.*, Hannula, S.E.*, De Long, J.R.*, Huberty, M., Jongen, R., Kielak, A., Steinauer, K., Zhu, F. and Bezemer, T.M. (2020), Plant community composition steers grassland vegetation via soil legacy effects. Ecology Letters 23: 973-982. doi:10.1111/ele.13497
Here we show in a field-based manipulation that conditioning plant community – via effects on soil fungi – steer the composition of responding plant community. We show that the effects of observed are potentially driven by grass-specific plant pathogenic fungi.
Hannula, S.E., Ma, H.K., Pérez-Jaramillo J.E., Pineda, A & Bezemer, T.M.: (2020) Structure and ecological function of the soil microbiome affecting plant-soil feedbacks in the presence of a soil-borne pathogen. Environmental microbiology 22: 660-676. doi:10.1111/1462-2920.14882
Here we conditioned soils with 37 plant species and relate it to performance of the following plant in absence and presence of pathogen. We show that microbiomes predict largely the performance of the following plant but that the composition of the micorbiome cannot be predicted by the functional group of the plant in conditioning phase.
Hannula, S.E., Kielak, A.M., Steinauer, K., Huberty, M., Jongen, R., De Long, J.R., Heinen, R., Bezemer, T.M. (2019) Time after time: temporal variation in the effects of plant species and plant functional groups on soil bacterial and fungal communities. mBio 10 (6): e02635-19
In this article we show that bacterial communities change largely over time while fungal communities are more stable and affected more by the plants (and their functional groups) growing in the soils.
Hannula, S.E., Zhu, F., Heinen, R., Bezemer, T.M. (2019): Foliar-feeding insects acquire microbiomes from the soil rather than the host plant. Nature communications 10 (1), 1254
In this article we identified microbiomes in the soils, inside plant roots and leaves and inside plant feeding caterpillars kept on both intact leaves and whole plants. We show that the legacy of past plant communities can be detected in the caterpillars kept on whole plants and that they share large part of their microbiome with soil indicating that they pick up their microbiome from the soil (rather than food sources). This opens a whole new research area and it will be interesting to study how food and environment affect development and performance of other insects. Furthermore, it will be interesting to study the transfer of microbiomes between trophic levels.
Hannula, S.E., Morriën, E., de Hollander, M., van der Putten, W.H., van Veen, J.A., de Boer, W. (2017): Shifts in rhizosphere fungal community during secondary succession following abandonment from agriculture. ISMEJ 11: 2294–2304
In this article we show using stable isotopes combined with high-throughput sequencing (DNA-SIP) that rhizosphere fungal community function changes during secondary succession in grasslands taken out from agricultural production. We show a shift from yeast and pathogen rich community in early successional stages towards a mutualist rich communities in later successional stages and relate this to the fungal feeding organisms.
Hannula, S.E.*, Morriën, E.*, Snoek, L.B., Helmsing, N.R., Zweers, H., de Hollander, M., Luján Soto, R., Bouffaud, M.-L., Buée, M., Dimmers, W., Duyts, H., Geisen, S., Girlanda, M., Griffiths, R.I., Jørgensen, H.-B., Jensen, J., Plassart, P., Redecker, D., Schmelz, R.M., Schmidt, O., Thomson, B.C, Tisserant, E., Uroz, S., Winding, A., Bailey, M.J., Bonkowski, M., Faber, J.H., Martin, F., Lemanceau, P., de Boer, W., van Veen, J.A., van der Putten, W.H. (2017): Soil networks become more connected and take up more carbon as nature restoration progresses. Nature communications 8: 14349
Using 13C labeling of intact soil cores and resolving the whole soil foodweb, we show that secondary succession of ex-arable fields leads to more connected soil communities that can store the carbon more efficiently. We also highlight that relative importance of fungi becomes bigger when longer time is past since agriculture and show that this leads to increased retention of carbon in the system.
Creamer, R.E., Hannula, S.E., van Leeuwen, J.P., Stone, D., Rutgers, M., Schmelz, R.M., de Ruiter, P.C., Bohse Hendriksen, N., Bolger, T., Bouffaud, M.-L., Buee, M., Carvalho, F., Costa, D., Dirilgen, T., Francisco, R., Griffiths, B.S., Martin, F., Martins da Silva, P., Mendes, S., Morais, P.V., Pereira , C., Philippot, L., Plassart, P., Redecker, D., Römbke, J., Sousa, J.P., Wouterse, M., Lemanceau, P., 2016. Ecological network analysis reveals the inter-connection between soil biodiversity and ecosystem function as affected by land use across Europe. (2015) Applied Soil Ecology 97 (112-124).
This article is a result of large transect collected across Europe. Here we explore by using for example network analysis the relationships between groups of soil biota change depending on land-use type and for example soil pH and that this could be related to ecosystem functions.
Hannula S.E., Boschker HTS, de Boer W, van Veen JA. (2012). 13C pulse-labeling assessment of the community structure of active fungi in the rhizosphere of a genetically starch-modified potato (Solanum tuberosum) cultivar and its parental isoline. New Phytologist 194(3): 784-799.
In this article we showed using 13C labeling of whole plants combined with PLFA-SIP and RNA-SIP that fungi are important component of soil microbiome in agricultural soils in terms of amount of carbon they receive from the plant especially at older stages of growth of the plant. This research sparked the idea to look into the role of fungi in agricultural systems in more detail.