The underestimated fraction: diversity, challenges and novel insights into unicellular cyanobionts of lichens

作者：Patrick Jung, Laura Williams, Burkhard Büdel, Matthias Schultz, Dennis J. Nürnberg, Martín Grube, Paul M. D’Agostino, Jan Mareš, Jan Mareš, Maike Lorenz, Manuel Luis González, Manuela Dal Forno, Martin Westberg, Nathan Chrismas, Nicole Pietrasiak, Paul F. Whelan, Petr Dvořák, Alica Košuthová, Spyros Gkelis, Thorsten Bauersachs, Ulf Schiefelbein, Võ Thị Phi Giao, Michael Lakatos, INCb · 发表于：ISME Communications · 年份：2024 · DOI：10.1093/ismeco/ycae069 · 被引用次数：7 · 研究领域：Lichen and fungal ecology、Botany and Plant Ecology Studies、Biocrusts and Microbial Ecology

Lichens are remarkable and classic examples of symbiotic organisms that have fascinated scientists for centuries. Yet, it has only been for a couple of decades that significant advances have focused on the diversity of their green algal and/or cyanobacterial photobionts. Cyanolichens, which contain cyanobacteria as their photosynthetic partner, include up to 10% of all known lichens and, as such, studies on their cyanobionts are much rarer compared to their green algal counterparts. For the unicellular cyanobionts, i.e. cyanobacteria that do not form filaments, these studies are even scarcer. Nonetheless, these currently include at least 10 different genera in the cosmopolitan lichen order Lichinales. An international consortium (International Network of CyanoBionts; INCb) will tackle this lack of knowledge. In this article, we discuss the status of current unicellular cyanobiont research, compare the taxonomic resolution of photobionts from cyanolichens with those of green algal lichens (chlorolichens), and give a roadmap of research on how to recondition the underestimated fraction of symbiotic unicellular cyanobacteria in lichens.