Description:Pyrophilous fungi are fungi that appear predominantly after wildfires. Some of these are triggered by heat some have pH and nutritional profiles that lend themselves to post-fire soils and some exhibit sudden fruiting in response to host death. Where these fungi reside in the absence of fire has been a mystery. We surveyed pyrophilous fruiting bodies appearing after the 2016 wildfire in the Great Smoky Mountains National park. We also surveyed endophytes and mycorrhiza in pines germinating after the fire. I’ll cover some of the pyrophilous fungi we observed and show some pyrophilous fungi may actually be endophytes in non-fire conditions. About Karen W. Hughes:Karen Hughes is Professor Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology University of Tennessee Knoxville. She received a Ph.D. in Genetics from University of Utah. She is Fellow of the Mycological Society of America; Fellow American Association for the Advancement of Science. She received the College of Arts and Sciences award for Distinguished Research Career at the University of Tennessee. She is author of 146 scientific publications during 40 years of teaching and research in the plant sciences. She is married to Ronald H. Petersen Mycologist who taught her about fungi.