In the past most studies have used plant growth, AM fungal
colonization and/or P uptake to demonstrate potential toxicity of
pesticides on AM fungi (Schweiger and Jakobsen, 1998; Druille
et al., 2012). In vitro tests in Ri T-DNA-transferred carrot roots have
been also used to assess the toxicity of pesticides on AM fungi(Wan
and Rahe, 1998; Li et al., 2013). However, these tests do not provide
any information regarding the impact of pesticides on the diversity
and community structure of AM fungi. The fast development of
molecular tools during the past 10 years (Rosendahl, 2008) allowed
us to go beyond the simple observation of the indirect effects of
pesticides on the performance of mycorrhizal plants, and further
explore the direct effect of pesticides on abundance, diversity and
function of the micro-symbiotic partner.