English
Environmental variables influence endophytic fungal communities of Codium fragile along the East Sea coast of Korea
Yu-na Choi, Ji-Won Kim, Seong-Eun Kim, Ahn-Heum Eom*
Department of Biology Education, Korea National University of Education, Cheongju 28173, Republic of Korea.
Endophytic fungal communities associated with the green macroalga Codium fragile along the East Sea coast of Korea have not been well characterized. In this study, we examined the composition of endophytic fungal communities isolated from C. fragile collected at three coastal sites (Sokcho, Uljin, and Pohang) and evaluated their relationships with environmental variables, including temperature, salinity, pH, dissolved oxygen (DO), chemical oxygen demand (COD), nitrogen (TN, DIN), phosphorus (TP, DIP), silicate (Si(OH)₄), and chlorophyll-a. Principal coordinates analysis (PCoA) showed moderate differences in community composition among sites, with partial overlap among samples. Redundancy analysis (RDA), constrained by environmental variables, revealed a clearer but still incomplete separation among sites, suggesting that variation in fungal communities is partly associated with environmental conditions. Environmental variables showed similar directions in ordination space, indicating that these communities are influenced by multiple environmental factors rather than a single dominant variable.
