Study on Status of Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi Associated with Barley in Damghan Region, Iran

This study was carried out in order to identification، spore population abundance، diversity pattern، determination of colonization index as well as arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal species morphological diversity in barley (Hordeum vulgare) rhizosphere in Damghan region. Sampling was done in May، June and July of 2009 from different barley fields in Damghan region. Sampling areas were classified to 7 parts and 44 composite soil samples collected. Spores of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi were observed in all of collected soil samples. The spores population was 72-840 spors per 35g dry soil. The most average number of spores belonged to southern parts of Damghan (349. 73 spores) followed by Northern، South east، North east، Western، Eastern and North west parts، respectively. Mycorrhizal frequency (F%) was 100% in all sampling areas except of region 3 (97. 5%). On the other hand، Mycorrhizal intensity (M%) was varied from 24. 06% in region 7 up to 69. 2% in region 5. Species richness was also 7 species in region 5 and 12 species in region 6. In this study 16 fungal species were identified in barley rhizosphere from Damghan region which 13 species of them belonged to Glomus genus and only 1 species was identified in each genus including Acaulospora، Pacispora and Scutellospora. The Glomus was the prevalent genus in Barley rhizosphere in Damghan region. G. corymbiforme and G. trimurales were reported for the first time in Iran. The most and least relative abundances were observed on G. intraradices (12. 66%) and Pacispora scintillans (1. 99%)، respectively. key words