Feedback with soil biota is an important determinant of terrestrial plant diversity. However, the factors regulating plant-soil feedback, which varies from positive to negative among plant species, remain uncertain. In a large-scale study involving 55 species and 550 populations of North American trees, the type of mycorrhizal association explained much of the variation in plant-soil feedbacks. In soil collected beneath conspecifics, arbuscular mycorrhizal trees experienced negative feedback, whereas ectomycorrhizal trees displayed positive feedback. Additionally, arbuscular mycorrhizal trees exhibited strong conspecific inhibition at multiple spatial scales, whereas ectomycorrhizal trees exhibited conspecific facilitation locally and less severe conspecific inhibition regionally. These results suggest that mycorrhizal type, through effects on plant-soil feedbacks, could be an important contributor to population regulation and community structure in temperate forests.

Summary1 Metacommunity and neutral theory have reinvigorated the study of 'niches' and have emphasized the importance of understanding the influences of competition, abiotic factors and regional spatial processes in shaping communities. 2 We conducted a field survey to examine the effects of soil characteristics and distance on arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungal communities of maize ( Zea mays ) in sand and clay soils. To address whether the field distributions of AM fungal species represented their fundamental or realized niches, we grew representative species of the two dominant genera, Glomus and Gigaspora , alone or together on Sorghum bicolor plants in sand, clay or a sand/clay mixture in the glasshouse. 3 In the field, soil characteristics and spatial structure accounted for significant proportions of the variation in community composition among sites, suggesting that both environmental variables and dispersal were important factors shaping AM fungal communities. 4 AM fungi in the family Glomeraceae occurred predominately in clay soils, whereas AM fungi in the family Gigasporaceae dominated in sand soils. Niche space of Glomeraceae was further partitioned by levels of soil organic carbon and nitrogen. 5 In the glasshouse, root colonization by Glomus was high in all three soils when grown in the absence of Gigaspora , indicating a broad fundamental niche . Root colonization by Gigaspora was negatively correlated with percentage clay when grown in the absence of Glomus , consistent with the low abundance of this family in clay soils in the field. When grown together, spore production of both Glomus and Gigaspora was significantly reduced only in the sand soil, indicating that competition could limit niches of both families in certain soil environments. 6 Our results suggest that AM fungal distributions are the product of environment, interspecific competition and regional spatial dynamics, emphasizing the importance of using a metacommunity perspective in community ecology.

Summary• We conducted meta-analyses of 290 published field and glasshouse trials to determine the effects of various agricultural practices on mycorrhizal colonization in nonsterile soils, and the consequence of those effects on yield, biomass, and phosphorus (P) concentration.• Mycorrhizal colonization was increased most by inoculation (29% increase), followed by shortened fallow (20%) and reduced soil disturbance (7%). The effect of crop rotation depended on whether the crop was mycorrhizal. Increased colonization resulted in a yield increase in the field of 23% across all management practices.• Biomass at harvest and shoot P concentration in early season were increased by inoculation (57 and 33%, respectively) and shortened fallow (55 and 24%). Reduced disturbance increased shoot P concentration by 27%, but biomass was not significantly affected. Biomass was significantly reduced in 2% of all trials in which there was a significant increase in colonization.• Irrespective of management practice, an increased mycorrhizal colonization was less likely to increase biomass if either soil P or indigenous inoculum potential was high.

Plants interact simultaneously with each other and with soil biota, yet the relative importance of competition vs. plant-soil feedback (PSF) on plant performance is poorly understood. Using a meta-analysis of 38 published studies and 150 plant species, we show that effects of interspecific competition (either growing plants with a competitor or singly, or comparing inter- vs. intraspecific competition) and PSF (comparing home vs. away soil, live vs. sterile soil, or control vs. fungicide-treated soil) depended on treatments but were predominantly negative, broadly comparable in magnitude, and additive or synergistic. Stronger competitors experienced more negative PSF than weaker competitors when controlling for density (inter- to intraspecific competition), suggesting that PSF could prevent competitive dominance and promote coexistence. When competition was measured against plants growing singly, the strength of competition overwhelmed PSF, indicating that the relative importance of PSF may depend not only on neighbour identity but also density. We evaluate how competition and PSFs might interact across resource gradients; PSF will likely strengthen competitive interactions in high resource environments and enhance facilitative interactions in low-resource environments. Finally, we provide a framework for filling key knowledge gaps and advancing our understanding of how these biotic interactions influence community structure.

Invasions by non-native plants can alter ecosystem functions and reduce native plant diversity, but relatively little is known about their effect on belowground microbial communities. We show that invasions by knapweed (Centaurea stoebe) and leafy spurge (Euphorbia esula, hereafter spurge)-but not cheatgrass (Bromus tectorum)-support a higher abundance and diversity of symbiotic arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) than multi-species native plant communities. The higher AMF richness associated with knapweed and spurge is unlikely due to a co-invasion by AMF, because a separate sampling showed that individual native forbs hosted a similar AMF abundance and richness as exotic forbs. Native grasses associated with fewer AMF taxa, which could explain the reduced AMF richness in native, grass-dominated communities. The three invasive plant species harbored distinct AMF communities, and analyses of co-occurring native and invasive plants indicate that differences were partly driven by the invasive plants and were not the result of pre-invasion conditions. Our results suggest that invasions by mycotrophic plants that replace poorer hosts can increase AMF abundance and richness. The high AMF richness in monodominant plant invasions also indicates that the proposed positive relationship between above and belowground diversity is not always strong. Finally, the disparate responses among exotic plants and consistent results between grasses and forbs suggest that AMF respond more to plant functional group than plant provenance.

Summary1. Divergent hypotheses have been proposed that suggest plant invasions either enhance or degrade the mutualism between plants and arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi, but their relative support remains unknown. 2. We conducted a meta-analysis using 67 publications, involving 70 native and 55 invasive plant species to assess support for the enhanced mutualism hypothesis, the degraded mutualism hypothesis and an alternative hypothesis that factors other than invasive status (such as plant functional group) better predict AM function following invasion. We used multiple measurements to test these hypotheses: AM fungal colonization, growth responses to AM fungi and AM fungal-mediated shifts in competitive interactions among native and invasive plants. Additionally, we assessed whether invasive plants alter AM associations in native plants and whether native and invasive plants host different AM fungal abundances and communities. 3. Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal colonization (%) and average growth responses did not differ between native and invasive plants. However, growth responses (AE) were dampened among invasive plants, and the positive correlation between AM fungal colonization and growth response in native plants was absent in invasive plants. Rather than plant invasive status, plant functional group was a significant explanatory factor; forbs were generally more colonized and exhibited positive growth responses (when grown alone and in competition), whereas grass responses were neutral to negative. 4. Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal abundance (measured by percentage colonization, extraradical hyphal and spore densities, as well as neutral lipid fatty acid and glomalin concentrations) did not differ between native and invasive plants, but invasive plants hosted different AM fungal communities in 78% of studies. AM fungal colonization of native plants was lower when grown with, or after, invasive plants, likely due to the prevalence of non-mycorrhizal plants in studies of neighbour and legacy effects. 5. Synthesis. Neither the degraded nor the enhanced mutualism hypothesis was supported, suggesting that invasions do not select for directional shifts in AM associations. Instead, our results indicate that AM fungi are most likely to influence invasion trajectories when native and invasive plants belong to different functional groups.

Paradoxically, symbiotic dinitrogen (N2 ) fixers are abundant in nitrogen (N)-rich, phosphorus (P)-poor lowland tropical rain forests. One hypothesis to explain this pattern states that N2 fixers have an advantage in acquiring soil P by producing more N-rich enzymes (phosphatases) that mineralise organic P than non-N2 fixers. We assessed soil and root phosphatase activity between fixers and non-fixers in two lowland tropical rain forest sites, but also addressed the hypothesis that arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) colonisation (another P acquisition strategy) is greater on fixers than non-fixers. Root phosphatase activity and AM colonisation were higher for fixers than non-fixers, and strong correlations between AM colonisation and N2 fixation at both sites suggest that the N-P interactions mediated by fixers may generally apply across tropical forests. We suggest that phosphatase enzymes and AM fungi enhance the capacity of N2 fixers to acquire soil P, thus contributing to their high abundance in tropical forests.

Summary• Ectomycorrhizal fungal communities can be structured by abiotic and biotic factors. Here, we present evidence for community structuring by species interactions.• We sampled ectomycorrhizas and forest floor seven times during a 13-month period. The presence of various ectomycorrhizal fungal species was determined for each sample, and species co-occurrence analyses were performed.• For both ectomycorrhizas and forest floor samples there was significantly less cooccurrence among species within the community than expected by chance, mostly because of negative associations involving Cenococcum geophilum or Clavulina cinerea . For some species pairs, there was significantly more co-occurrence than expected by chance. Both nitrogen and tannin additions to the forest floor altered some interactions among species.• The causes of these nonrandom distributions are currently unknown. Future investigations on competition, antibiosis, parasitism and facilitation among ectomycorrhizal fungal species appear to be warranted.