Host filtering, not competitive exclusion, may be the main driver of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal community assembly under high phosphorus

A major goal in ecology is understanding the factors which determine the diversity and distribution of organisms. The outcome of the symbiotic relationship between plants and arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi is strongly influenced by soil phosphorus (P) availability. Despite this knowledge, there is still much to uncover about how soil P status can shape the taxonomic and phylogenetic assembly of root-colonising AM fungi. Additionally, there is a paucity of understanding about the implications of these changes for the outcome of the AM symbiosis in terms of plant growth, nutrient status and defence traits. We conducted a factorial pot experiment where sorghum (Sorghum bicolor) was grown un…