Climate change is real: fungal perspective!

Climate change is apparent around the globe as it is dramatically affecting the natural ecosystems. The preliminary cause of climate change is increased green house gases, deforestation, and anthropogenic activities and the resultant change is seen in the form of extreme events like increased temperature, rainfall, permafrost thaw, glacial retreats, sea level, greater occurrence of wildfires, etc (NASA, 2016). It is causing tremendous effect on biodiversity therefore it becomes a serious concern globally. At the face of climate change the macroscopic organisms are either extinct or are at the verge of extinction and may adapt themselves for survival; efforts are successfully laid to conserve them but also it is equally important to focus on the existence, adaptation and alterations taking place in community composition of microscopic world. Impact of 1 trillion microbes inhabiting the planet earth on climate can be huge as they can accelerate climate change, exacerbated by pollution and habitat loss. However, they are understudied on climatic front, especially fungi, which represents a major portion of eukaryotic kingdom, resides in diverse habitats, constitutes considerable biomass on planet earth and regulate soil carbon feedback loop by deriving biogeochemical cycles; therefore they could be vulnerable to climate change largely by habitat loss. This review is an effort to draw the attention towards how fungal diversity responds to climate selection pressure either by adaptation or shifts in community composition observed during weather extremes.