[1] Curators of INVAM acquire, grow, identify, and elucidate the biology, taxonomy, and ecology of a diversity AMF with the mission to expand availability and knowledge of these symbiotic fungi.
[1] AMF spores acquired from INVAM have been used extensively in both basic and applied research projects in the fields of ecology, evolutionary biology, agroecology, and in restoration.
In 1985, Schenk’s vision was funded by the National Science Foundation to begin the International Culture Collection Vesicular Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi (INVAM).
The earliest fossil evidence of a glomeromycete arbuscule, the site of plant-fungi exchange, is known from the Rhynie Chert, which dates to 407 million years ago, during the Lower Devonian.
[15][16] Specific AMF-plant relationships can fall on various points of a mutualistic-pathogenic spectrum, depending on the associated species in the partnership,[17] and there is evidence that there could be significant differentiation in benefit conveyed when using native vs. commercially sourced inoculum.
[21] The founder of INVAM, Dr. Norman Schenk, is coauthor of the book “Manual for the Identification of VA Mycorrhizal Fungi”,[22] a refence that is still cited today in AMF taxonomic studies.