ABSTRACT
Objective To reveal fungal community composition and diversity in health and root rot of Coptis chinensis in rhizosphere soil. Methods High-throughput sequencing technology was used to characterize the fungal community composition, richness, and diversity of health and root rot Coptis chinensis in rhizosphere soil in Shizhu County of Chongqing Province. Spearman analysis was used to evaluate the correlation between soil physicochemical parameters and the first 35 most abundant fungal genera. Results More than 106 267 effective tags were obtained, and the community was composed of six phyla (Ascomycota, Zygomycota, Basidiomycota, Glomeromycota, Chytridiomycota, and Neocallimastigomycota). The fungal community diversity showed no significant difference in healthy and root rot samples. The relative abundance of Ascomycota, Basidiomycota and Chytridiomycota in root rot soil was significantly higher than that in healthy soil. Moreover, the relative abundance of Zygomycota, Glomeromycota, and Neocallimastigomycota in root rot soil was significantly lower than in healthy soil. The relative abundance of Fusarium was significantly higher in root rot samples than in healthy samples. Spearman analysis showed that the relative abundance of Fusarium was significantly positively correlated with pH and available phosphorus, but negatively correlated with alkali-hydrolyzable nitrogen. Conclusion Changes in soil physicochemical characteristics were related to the changes in soil fungal diversity.