Rhododendrons International - Volume 3, 2019, Part 2

This third volume of RI, broken into two parts because of the large size of the articles, contains the first series of research articles from the Rhododendron Research Network (R-RN), which is a collaboration between the American Rhododendron Society (ARS) and an international group of rhododendron researchers. [...] The functional and ecological aspects of roots and their associated microbes Root systems facilitate the acquisition of nutrients and water from soil, stabilize the 66 2019 soil matrix, and anchor plants to a fixed position in the soil (Den Herder et al. [...] The high diversity of root morphology across environments and among the world’s plant species speaks to the possibility that root traits may also evolve in response to the environment (Bingham and Bengough 2003, Bengough et al. [...] Understanding the relative roles of phylogeny and climate in driving the evolution of root morphology should continue to be a fruitful avenue of investigation, but we cannot overlook the potentially important role of sympatric soil microbes, which often interact directly with roots to affect root foraging functions (Chen et al. [...] In contrast, an increase in the number of root tips per carbon invested will improve the precision and intensity of root foraging, such that the plant can more effectively monopolize resources and take advantage of ephemeral nutrient hot-spots.