The answer is blowin' in the wind: insights from the transcriptomes of hair lichens (Bryoria spp.)

Toby Spribille (Graz): The lichen symbiosis is one of the most structurally complex terrestrial symbioses, yet one of the least well understood symbiotic systems. The fact that lichens are both nearly impossible to synthesize in culture and grow very slowly means that they have been largely out of reach of classical laboratory experimentation. As a result, we know little of their internal gene regulatory mechanisms and indeed how two Eukaryotes maintain a stable symbiosis. In addition, most of what we claim to know about their evolutionary relationships is derived from a few ribosomal loci. Next-generation sequencing approaches that are not dependent on culturing may offer a window into what is actually going on in living fungal and algal cells in nature and shed light on evolutionary processes. I will report on my recent work on the metatranscriptomes of Bryoria fremontii and Bryoria tortuosa and exploring the possibilities and limits of inferring expression patterns and divergence from these data.