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Mycology
An International Journal on Fungal Biology
Volume 14, 2023 - Issue 4
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Research Article

Genome and transcriptome reveal lithophilic adaptation of Cladophialophora brunneola, a new rock-inhabiting fungus

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Pages 326-343 | Received 26 Jul 2023, Accepted 04 Sep 2023, Published online: 26 Oct 2023
 

ABSTRACT

Rock-inhabiting fungi (RIF) are slow-growing microorganisms that inhabit rocks and exhibit exceptional stress tolerance owing to their thick melanised cell walls. This study reports the identification of a novel rock-inhabiting fungus, Cladophialophora brunneola sp. nov. which was isolated from a karst landform in Guizhou, China, using a combination of morphological and phylogenetic analyses. The genome of C. brunneola was sequenced and assembled, with a total size of approximately 33.8 Mb, encoding 14,168 proteins and yielding an N50 length of 1.88 Mb. C. brunneola possessed a larger proportion of species-specific genes, and phylogenomic analysis positioned it in an early diverged lineage within Chaetothyriales. In comparison to non-RIF, C. brunneola displayed reduction in carbohydrate-active enzyme families (CAZymes) and secondary metabolite biosynthetic gene clusters (BGCs). Transcriptome analysis conducted under PEG-induced drought stress revealed elevated expression levels of genes associated with melanin synthesis pathways, cell wall biosynthesis, and lipid metabolism. This study contributes to our understanding of the genomic evolution and polyextremotolerance exhibited by rock-inhabiting fungi.

Acknowledgments

The author thank Dr. Baosong Chen (State Key Laboratory of Mycology, Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China) for kindly help in melanin extraction.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The sequencing data are available at NCBI BioProject ID PRJNA952342.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/21501203.2023.2256764

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31970011, 31670014).