Appendix C. Additional methods and results pertaining to the identification of EMF taxa from ITS sequence data.
In certain cases, such as Sebacinaceae, samples were only assigned to clade or family because lack of available sequence data for this group prevented confident assignment to a given genus. In other instances, such as the thelephoroid clade, taxa were not assigned to genus because recent molecular systematic studies of this group have determined that these genera are not monophyletic (Koljalg et al. 2000). Seventeen ITS phylotypes could be assigned to species based on sequence similarity with fruiting body sequences from our database or from Genbank. An additional six taxa were exact matches with vouchered specimens in our collection that remain to be identified to species. However, many EMF taxa in this study, e.g., Tylospora spp., do not produce conspicuous epigeous reproductive structures; thus, a large proportion of these samples could not be matched to sequences generated from fruiting body surveys, and instead relied upon ≥ 97% ITS sequence similarity with named samples deposited in Genbank.
LITERATURE CITED
Koljalg, U., A. Dahlberg, A. F. S. Taylor, E. Larsson, N. Hallenberg, J. Stenlid, K.-H. Larsson, P. M. Fransson , O. Karen and L. Jonsson. 2000. Diversity and abundance of resupinate thelephoroid fungi as ectomycorrhizal symbionts in Swedish boreal forests. Molecular Ecology 9:1985–1996.