Phylogenetic diversity of insecticolous fusaria inferred from multilocus DNA sequence data and their molecular identification via FUSARIUM-ID and Fusarium MLST

Authors: O Donnell, Kerry; Humber, Richard; GEISER, DAVID - Pennsylvania State University; KANG, SEOGCHAN - Pennsylvania State University; PARK, BONGSOO - Pennsylvania State University; ROBERT, VICENT - Fungal Biodiversity; CROUS, PEDRO - Fungal Biodiversity; JOHNSTON, PETER - Landcare Research; AOKI, TAKAYUKI - National Institute Of Agrobiological Sciences (NIAS); Rooney, Alejandro - Alex; Rehner, Stephen

Submitted to: Mycologia
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 9/12/2011
Publication Date: 11/30/2011
Citation: O Donnell, K., Humber, R.A., Geiser, D.M., Kang, S., Park, B., Robert, V.A., Crous, P.W., Johnston, P.R., Aoki, T., Rooney, A.P., Rehner, S.A. 2011. Phylogenetic diversity of insecticolous fusaria inferred from multilocus DNA sequence data and their molecular identification via FUSARIUM-ID and Fusarium MLST. Mycologia. 104(2):427-445.

Interpretive Summary: The primary objective of the present study was use Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) sequence data to molecularly type Fusarium isolates in the Agricultural Research Collection of Entomopathogenic Fungi (ARSEF), thereby increasing their potential as biological control agents of insect pests. Moreover, because Fusarium contains many toxin-producing plant pathogens, as well as isolates that are responsible for opportunistic infections of humans, precise molecular identifications are critical to eliminate the risk of inadvertently releasing a toxigenic pathogen into the environment. We identified Fusarium isolates in the ARSEF collection using DNA sequence data from portions of several genes. The data generated in this study have been made available to the global scientific community via the following two web-accessible databases dedicated to DNA sequence based identification of fusaria: FUSARIUM-ID (http://isolate.fusariumdb.org) at The Pennsylvania State University and the Fusarium MLST database (http://www.cbs.knaw.nl/fusarium) at the Centraalbureau voor Schimmelcultures (CBS-KNAW) Biodiversity Center. The results of this study, including the expanded web-accessible informational databases, will greatly benefit diverse agricultural and medical scientists who need precise identifications of these toxin-producing pathogens.

Technical Abstract: We constructed several multilocus Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) sequence datasets to assess the phylogenetic diversity of insecticolous fusaria, especially focusing on those housed in the Agricultural Research Service Collection of Entomopathogenic Fungi (ARSEF), and to facilitate molecular identifications of unknowns via the FUSARIUM-ID and Fusarium Multilocus sequence typing (MLST) online databases and analysis packages. Analyses of a 190-taxon two-locus dataset, which included 159 entomogenous isolates, indicated that: 1) insect-associated fusaria were nested within 10 species complexes spanning the phylogenetic breadth of Fusarium, 2) novel, putatively unnamed insecticolous species were nested within 8/10 species complexes, and 3) Latin binomials could be applied with confidence to only 18/58 phylogenetically distinct fusaria associated with pest insects. Phylogenetic analyses of an 82-taxon three-locus dataset nearly fully resolved evolutionary relationships among the 10 clades containing insecticolous fusaria. Multilocus typing of isolates within 4 species complexes identified surprisingly high genetic diversity in that 63/65 of the fusaria typed represented newly discovered haplotypes. The DNA sequence data, together with corrected ABI sequence chromatograms and alignments, have been uploaded to the following web-accessible sites dedicated to identifying fusaria: FUSARIUM-ID (http://isolate.fusariumdb.org) at The Pennsylvania State University’s Department of Plant Pathology and Fusarium MLST (http://www.cbs.knaw.nl/fusarium) at the Centraalbureau voor Schimmelcultures (CBS-KNAW) Fungal Biodiversity Center.