Cultivable fungi present in Antarctic soils: taxonomy, phylogeny, diversity, and bioprospecting of antiparasitic and herbicidal metabolites

• Published in: Extremophiles : life under extreme conditions Vol. 22; no. 3; pp. 381 - 393
• Main Authors: Gomes, Eldon C. Q., Godinho, Valéria M., Silva, Débora A. S., de Paula, Maria T. R., Vitoreli, Gislaine A., Zani, Carlos L., Alves, Tânia M. A., Junior, Policarpo A. S., Murta, Silvane M. F., Barbosa, Emerson C., Oliveira, Jaquelline G., Oliveira, Fabio S., Carvalho, Camila R., Ferreira, Mariana C., Rosa, Carlos A., Rosa, Luiz H.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Tokyo Springer Japan 01-05-2018; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Allium - drug effects; Antarctic Regions; Antiprotozoal Agents - pharmacology; Antiviral Agents - pharmacology; Bats; Biochemistry; Biodiversity; Biology; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Bioprospecting; Biotechnology; Chemotherapy; Chiroptera; Cultivars; Dengue Virus - drug effects; Fermentation; Fungi; Fungi - classification; Fungi - genetics; Fungi - isolation & purification; Fungi - metabolism; Genera; Herbicides; Herbicides - pharmacology; Islands; Lactuca - drug effects; Life Sciences; Metabolites; Microbial Ecology; Microbiology; Microbiota; Molecular biology; Mortierella; Original Paper; Parasites; Penicillium; Penicillium chrysogenum; Phylogeny; Soil; Soil Microbiology; Soil microorganisms; Soils; Solid state fermentation; Taxa; Taxonomy; Tropical climate; Trypanosoma cruzi - drug effects; Zika Virus - drug effects; Fungi; Neglected tropical diseases; Antarctica; Pseudogymnoascus; Mortierella
• ISSN: 1431-0651; 1433-4909
• DOI: 10.1007/s00792-018-1003-1

Molecular biology techniques were used to identify 218 fungi from soil samples collected from four islands of Antarctica. These consisted of 22 taxa of 15 different genera belonging to the Zygomycota, Ascomycota, and Basidiomycota.
Mortierella
,
Antarctomyces
,
Pseudogymnoascus
, and
Penicillium
were the most frequently isolated genera and
Penicillium tardochrysogenum
,
Penicillium verrucosus
,
Goffeauzyma gilvescens
, and
Mortierella
sp. 2 the most abundant taxa. All fungal isolates were cultivated using solid-state fermentation to obtain their crude extracts.
Pseudogymnoascus destructans
,
Mortierella parvispora
, and
Penicillium chrysogenum
displayed antiparasitic activities, whilst extracts of
P. destructans
,
Mortierella amoeboidea
,
Mortierella
sp. 3, and
P. tardochrysogenum
showed herbicidal activities. Reported as pathogenic for bats, different isolates of
P. destructans
exhibited trypanocidal activities and herbicidal activity, and may be a source of bioactive molecules to be considered for chemotherapy against neglected tropical diseases. The abundant presence of
P. destructans
in soils of the four islands gives evidence supporting that soils in the Antarctic Peninsula constitute a natural source of strains of this genus, including some
P. destructans
strains that are phylogenetically close to those that infect bats in North America and Europe/Palearctic Asia.