Open AccessPotentiality of the cox1 gene in the taxonomic resolution of soil fungi
Author(s) -
Molitor Claire,
Inthavong Beatrice,
Sage Lucile,
Geremia Roberto A.,
Mouhamadou Bello
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
fems microbiology letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.899
H-Index - 151
eISSN - 1574-6968
pISSN - 0378-1097
DOI - 10.1111/j.1574-6968.2009.01839.x
Subject(s) - biology , internal transcribed spacer , phylogenetic tree , ascomycota , gene , phylogenetics , interspecific competition , mycology , biodiversity , intron , genus , genetics , botany , evolutionary biology , ecology
We explored the potential of the cox1 gene in the species resolution of soil fungi and compared it with the nuclear internal transcribed spacer (ITS) and small subunit (SSU)‐rDNA. Conserved primers allowing the amplification of the fungal cox1 gene were designed, and a total of 47 isolates of Zygomycota and Ascomycota were investigated. The analysis revealed a lack of introns in >90% of the isolates. Comparison of the species of each of the six studied genera showed high interspecific sequence polymorphisms. Indeed, the average of nucleotide variations (4.2–11%) according to the genus, due mainly to the nucleotide substitutions, led to the taxonomic resolution of all the species studied regarding both ITS and SSU‐rDNA, in which <88% were discriminated. The phylogenetic analysis performed after alignment of the cox1 gene across distant fungal species was in accordance with the well‐known taxonomic position of the species studied and no overlap was observed between intra‐ and interspecific variations. These results clearly demonstrated that the cox1 sequences could provide good molecular markers for the determination of the species composition of environmental samples and constitute an important advance to study soil fungal biodiversity.