Opinion Article Branching out: Towards a trait-based understanding of fungal ecology Carlos A. AGUILAR-TRIGUEROS a,b, *, Stefan HEMPEL a,b , Jeff R. POWELL c , Ian C. ANDERSON c , Janis ANTONOVICS d , Joana BERGMANN a,b , Timothy R. CAVAGNARO e , Baodong CHEN f , Miranda M. HART g , John KLIRONOMOS g , Jana S. PETERMANN a,b , Erik VERBRUGGEN a,b , Stavros D. VERESOGLOU a,b , Matthias C. RILLIG a,b a Freie Universit€ at Berlin, Institute of Biology, D-14195 Berlin, Germany b Berlin-Brandenburg Institute of Advanced Biodiversity Research (BBIB), D-14195 Berlin, Germany c University of Western Sydney, Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia d University of Virginia, Department of Biology, Charlottesville, VA 22904, USA e School of Agriculture, Food and Wine, University of Adelaide, Waite Campus, Glen Osmond, 5064 SA, Australia f State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China g Biology, University of British Columbia-Okanagan, Kelowna, BC, Canada article info Article history: Received 9 October 2014 Received in revised form 5 January 2015 Accepted 4 March 2015 Keywords: Community assembly Ecosystem processes Resource allocation Traits abstract Fungal ecology lags behind in the use of traits (i.e. phenotypic characteristics) to under- stand ecological phenomena. We argue that this is a missed opportunity and that the se- lection and systematic collection of trait data throughout the fungal kingdom will reap major benefits in ecological and evolutionary understanding of fungi. To develop our argu- ment, we first employ plant trait examples to show the power of trait-based approaches in understanding ecological phenomena such as identifying species allocation resources pat- terns, inferring community assembly and understanding diversityeecosystem functioning relationships. Second, we discuss ecologically relevant traits in fungi that could be used to answer such ecological phenomena and can be measured on a large proportion of the fungal kingdom. Third, we identify major challenges and opportunities for widespread, coordinated collection and sharing of fungal trait data. The view that we propose has the potential to allow mycologists to contribute considerably more influential studies in the area of fungal ecology and evolution, as has been demonstrated by comparable earlier efforts by plant ecologists. This represents a change of paradigm, from community profiling efforts through massive sequencing tools, to a more mechanistic understanding of fungal ecology. ª 2015 The British Mycological Society. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. * Corresponding author. Altensteinstraße 6, Freie Universit€ at Berlin, Institute of Biology, D-14195 Berlin, Germany. Tel.: þ49 (0)30 838 53143. E-mail address: calgit@gmail.com (C. A. Aguilar-Trigueros). journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/fbr fungal biology reviews xxx (2015) 1 e8 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.fbr.2015.03.001 1749-4613/ª 2015 The British Mycological Society. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Please cite this article in press as: Aguilar-Trigueros, C.A., et al., Branching out: Towards a trait-based understanding of fungal ecology, Fungal Biology Reviews (2015), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.fbr.2015.03.001