An open source chimera checker for the fungal ITS region

The internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region of the nuclear ribosomal repeat unit holds a central position in the pursuit of the taxonomic affiliation of fungi recovered through environmental sampling. Newly generated fungal ITS sequences are typically compared against the International Nucleotide Sequence Databases for a species or genus name using the sequence similarity software suite blast . Such searches are not without complications however, and one of them is the presence of chimeric entries among the query or reference sequences. Chimeras are artificial sequences, generated unintentionally during the polymerase chain reaction step, that feature sequence data from two (or possibly more) distinct species. Available software solutions for chimera control do not readily target the fungal ITS region, but the present study introduces a blast -based open source software package (available at http://www.emerencia.org/chimerachecker.html ) to examine newly generated fungal ITS sequences for the presence of potentially chimeric elements in batch mode. We used the software package on a random set of 12 300 environmental fungal ITS sequences in the public sequence databases and found 1.5% of the entries to be chimeric at the ordinal level after manual verification of the results. The proportion of chimeras in the sequence databases can be hypothesized to increase as emerging sequencing technologies drawing from pooled DNA samples are becoming important tools in molecular ecology research.     

Towards a unified paradigm for sequence‐based identification of fungi

The nuclear ribosomal internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region is the formal fungal barcode and in most cases the marker of choice for the exploration of fungal diversity in environmental samples. Two problems are particularly acute in the pursuit of satisfactory taxonomic assignment of newly generated ITS sequences: (i) the lack of an inclusive, reliable public reference data set and (ii) the lack of means to refer to fungal species, for which no Latin name is available in a standardized stable way. Here, we report on progress in these regards through further development of the UNITE database ( http://unite.ut.ee ) for molecular identification of fungi. All fungal species represented by at least two ITS sequences in the international nucleotide sequence databases are now given a unique, stable name of the accession number type (e.g. Hymenoscyphus pseudoalbidus|GU586904|SH133781.05FU), and their taxonomic and ecological annotations were corrected as far as possible through a distributed, third‐party annotation effort. We introduce the term ‘species hypothesis’ (SH) for the taxa discovered in clustering on different similarity thresholds (97–99%). An automatically or manually designated sequence is chosen to represent each such SH. These reference sequences are released ( http://unite.ut.ee/repository.php ) for use by the scientific community in, for example, local sequence similarity searches and in the QIIME pipeline. The system and the data will be updated automatically as the number of public fungal ITS sequences grows. We invite everybody in the position to improve the annotation or metadata associated with their particular fungal lineages of expertise to do so through the new Web‐based sequence management system in UNITE.     

ITS2 metabarcoding analysis complements lichen mycobiome diversity data

Lichen thalli harbor complex fungal communities (mycobiomes) of species with divergent trophic and ecological strategies. The complexity and diversity of lichen mycobiomes are still largely unknown, despite surveys combining culture-based methods and high-throughput sequencing (HTS). The results of such surveys are strongly influenced by the barcode locus chosen, its sensitivity in discriminating taxa, and the depth to which public sequence repositories cover the phylogenetic spectrum of fungi. Here, we use HTS of the internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) to assess the taxonomic composition and diversity of a well-characterized, alpine rock lichen community that includes thalli symptomatically infected by lichenicolous fungi as well as asymptomatic thalli. Taxa belonging to the order Chaetothyriales are the major components of the observed lichen mycobiomes. We predict sequences representative of lichenicolous fungi characterized morphologically and assess their asymptomatic presence in lichen thalli. We demonstrated the limitations of metabarcoding in fungi and show how the estimation of species diversity widely differs when ITS1 or ITS2 are used as barcode, and particularly biases the detection of Basidiomycota. The complementary analysis of both ITS1 and ITS2 loci is therefore required to reliably estimate the diversity of lichen mycobiomes.     

V-REVCOMP: automated high-throughput detection of reverse complementary 16S rRNA gene sequences in large environmental and taxonomic datasets

Reverse complementary DNA sequences - sequences that are inadvertently given backwards with all purines and pyrimidines transposed - can affect sequence analysis detrimentally unless taken into account. We present an open-source, high-throughput software tool -v-revcomp (http://www.cmde.science.ubc.ca/mohn/software.html) - to detect and reorient reverse complementary entries of the small-subunit rRNA (16S) gene from sequencing datasets, particularly from environmental sources. The software supports sequence lengths ranging from full length down to the short reads that are characteristic of next-generation sequencing technologies. We evaluated the reliability of v-revcomp by screening all 406 781 16S sequences deposited in release 102 of the curated SILVA database and demonstrated that the tool has a detection accuracy of virtually 100%. We subsequently used v-revcomp to analyse 1 171 646 16S sequences deposited in the International Nucleotide Sequence Databases and found that about 1% of these user-submitted sequences were reverse complementary. In addition, a nontrivial proportion of the entries were otherwise anomalous, including reverse complementary chimeras, sequences associated with wrong taxa, nonribosomal genes, sequences of poor quality or otherwise erroneous sequences without a reasonable match to any other entry in the database. Thus, v-revcomp is highly efficient in detecting and reorienting reverse complementary 16S sequences of almost any length and can be used to detect various sequence anomalies.     

1株产漆酶白腐真菌的筛选和鉴定

从不同的生境采集生物样品,利用Bavendamm反应反复筛选产漆酶的白腐真菌。利用真菌通用引物对ITS1/ITS4扩增菌株rDNAITS区序列,对扩增产物进行测序。测序结果在GenBank中进行同源性搜索,下载部分具有代表性种的ITS序列进行序列比对,利用软件MEGA4构建分子系统发育树,通过序列分析,并结合形态学鉴定出4220为香栓孔菌(Trametes suaveolens)。     

Identification and targeted cultivation of abundant novel freshwater sphingomonads and analysis of their population substructure

Little is known with respect to bacterial population structures in freshwater environments. Using complementary culture-based, cloning, and high-throughput Illumina sequencing approaches, we investigated microdiverse clusters of bacteria that comprise members with identical or very similar 16S rRNA gene sequences. Two 16S rRNA phylotypes could be recovered by cultivation in low-nutrient-strength liquid media from two lakes of different trophic status. Both phylotypes were found to be physiologically active in situ throughout most of the year, as indicated by the presence of their rRNA sequences in the samples. Analyses of internal transcribed spacer (ITS1) sequences revealed the presence of seven different sequence types among cultured representatives and the cloned rrn fragments. Illumina sequencing yielded 8,576 ITS1 sequences that encompassed 15 major and numerous rare sequence types. The major ITS1 types exhibited distinct temporal patterns, suggesting that the corresponding Sphingomonadaceae lineages occupy different ecological niches. However, since strains of the same ITS1 type showed highly variable substrate utilization patterns, the potential mechanism of niche separation in Sphingomonadaceae cannot be explained by substrate utilization alone and may be related to other traits.     

药用野生稻复合体ITS1和ITS2序列变异及其系统进化分析

通过PCR扩增并测序分析稻属药用野生稻复合体5个野生稻种基因组完整的ITS区及5.8S区,并与栽培稻ITS序列进行比较,构建分子系统进化树,探讨了稻属药用野生稻复合体内不同种间的亲缘关系和系统进化.结果表明,ITS1和ITS2均有较高的G/C含量,ITS1序列的长度多态性相对较高,ITS2序列的碱基突变频率较高.药用野生稻和高秆野生稻亲缘关系很近,而与栽培稻亲缘关系较远;短药野生稻、斑点野生稻、澳洲野生稻与药用野生稻亲缘关系渐近.处于进化的过渡阶段.     

High-coverage ITS primers for the DNA-based identification of ascomycetes and basidiomycetes in environmental samples

The kingdom Fungi is estimated to include 1.5 million or more species, playing key roles as decomposers, mutualists, and parasites in every biome on the earth. To comprehensively understand the diversity and ecology of this huge kingdom, DNA barcoding targeting the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region of the nuclear ribosomal repeat has been regarded as a prerequisite procedure. By extensively surveying ITS sequences in public databases, we designed new ITS primers with improved coverage across diverse taxonomic groups of fungi compared to existing primers. An in silico analysis based on public sequence databases indicated that the newly designed primers matched 99% of ascomycete and basidiomycete ITS taxa (species, subspecies or varieties), causing little taxonomic bias toward either fungal group. Two of the newly designed primers could inhibit the amplification of plant sequences and would enable the selective investigation of fungal communities in mycorrhizal associations, soil, and other types of environmental samples. Optimal PCR conditions for the primers were explored in an in vitro investigation. The new primers developed in this study will provide a basis for ecological studies on the diversity and community structures of fungi in the era of massive DNA sequencing.     

Tasting soil fungal diversity with earth tongues: phylogenetic test of SATé alignments for environmental ITS data

An abundance of novel fungal lineages have been indicated by DNA sequencing of the nuclear ribosomal ITS region from environmental samples such as soil and wood. Although phylogenetic analysis of these novel lineages is a key component of unveiling the structure and diversity of complex communities, such analyses are rare for environmental ITS data due to the difficulties of aligning this locus across significantly divergent taxa. One potential approach to this issue is simultaneous alignment and tree estimation. We targeted divergent ITS sequences of the earth tongue fungi (Geoglossomycetes), a basal class in the Ascomycota, to assess the performance of SATé, recent software that combines progressive alignment and tree building. We found that SATé performed well in generating high-quality alignments and in accurately estimating the phylogeny of earth tongue fungi. Drawing from a data set of 300 sequences of earth tongues and progressively more distant fungal lineages, 30 insufficiently identified ITS sequences from the public sequence databases were assigned to the Geoglossomycetes. The association between earth tongues and plants has been hypothesized for a long time, but hard evidence is yet to be collected. The ITS phylogeny showed that four ectomycorrhizal isolates shared a clade with Geoglossum but not with Trichoglossum earth tongues, pointing to the significant potential inherent to ecological data mining of environmental samples. Environmental sampling holds the key to many focal questions in mycology, and simultaneous alignment and tree estimation, as performed by SATé, can be a highly efficient companion in that pursuit.     

UNITE: a database providing web-based methods for the molecular identification of ectomycorrhizal fungi

Identification of ectomycorrhizal (ECM) fungi is often achieved through comparisons of ribosomal DNA internal transcribed spacer (ITS) sequences with accessioned sequences deposited in public databases. A major problem encountered is that annotation of the sequences in these databases is not always complete or trustworthy. In order to overcome this deficiency, we report on UNITE, an open-access database. UNITE comprises well annotated fungal ITS sequences from well defined herbarium specimens that include full herbarium reference identification data, collector/source and ecological data. At present UNITE contains 758 ITS sequences from 455 species and 67 genera of ECM fungi. UNITE can be searched by taxon name, via sequence similarity using blastn, and via phylogenetic sequence identification using galaxie. Following implementation, galaxie performs a phylogenetic analysis of the query sequence after alignment either to pre-existing generic alignments, or to matches retrieved from a blast search on the UNITE data. It should be noted that the current version of UNITE is dedicated to the reliable identification of ECM fungi. The UNITE database is accessible through the URL http://unite.zbi.ee     

基于香菇菌株rDNA-ITS序列的系统发育分析

根据真菌核糖体通用引物ITS1和ITS4扩增出13个福建袋栽香菇主要菌株的5.8S rDNA、ITS序列,对该序列进行测序后,得到完整的5.8S rDNA、ITS序列,将该序列提交NCBI并获得登录号,对该序列进行比对分析并构建了系统发育树,从分子水平对香菇菌株进行了区分鉴定,结果显示13个菌株可以明显的分成2丛,而其他菌株又可以从一丛中延伸出几个亚丛。     

山茱萸不同栽培品种的 rDNA ITS 序列分析

为测定山茱萸（Cornus officinalis Sieb.et.Zucc.）核糖体DNA的ITS序列,对山茱萸不同栽培品种进行了ITS序列分析。通过实验筛选出一对引物,进行PCR扩增,对扩增产物提取纯化,双脱氧链终止法DNA测序。然后,利用DNAssist Version 2.0软件加手工校正确定ITS1-5.8S-ITS2序列,并进行ITS序列分析。获得了山茱萸的ITS1-5.8S-ITS2完全序列,ITS1为253bp,5.8S为156bp,ITS2为273bp,总共682bp。7种果型的山茱萸其5.8S基因序列显示高度的一致性,圆柱形果型、长梨形果型、椭圆形果型和纺锤形果型的ITS区序列完全一致,短圆柱形果型在ITS1区3′端及ITS2区5′端各有1个变异位点;短梨形果型在ITS1区5′端有3个变异位点;长圆柱形果型在ITS1区有5个变异位点。结果表明,ITS序列在山茱萸种内比较保守,有的栽培品种之间有较小的差异,此研究为中药山茱萸分子鉴定提供了科学依据。     

用ITS序列研究杨属各组之间的系统发育关系

杨树是重要的工业用材树种。我国杨树遗传资源丰富 ,分布范围广泛 ,不少种为我国特有。开展杨属系统发育和分子进化研究 ,对丰富的杨树遗传资源保存和利用有着重大意义。杨属 (Ｐｏｐｕｌｕｓ)全世界约 10 0余种 ,属下通常分 5个组[1] 。胡志昂等[2 ] 对杨属不同组间的过氧化物酶同工酶进行了研究 ;李宽钰等[3] 利用ＲＡＰＤ标记技术对白杨组、青杨组、黑杨组 2 0个种作了遗传分析。但是在杨属系统分类上还存在着许多混乱 ,同物异名、同名异物现象相当普遍。本文以杨属 5个派主要代表种为材料 ,用ＰＣＲ产物直接测序法测定杨树ＩＴＳ序列 ,…     

A common core of secondary structure of the internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) throughout the Eukaryota

The ongoing characterization of novel species creates the need for a molecular marker which can be used for species- and, simultaneously, for mega-systematics. Recently, the use of the internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) sequence was suggested, as it shows a high divergence in sequence with an assumed conservation in structure. This hypothesis was mainly based on small-scale analyses, comparing a limited number of sequences. Here, we report a large-scale analysis of more than 54,000 currently known ITS2 sequences with the goal to evaluate the hypothesis of a conserved structural core and to assess its use for automated large-scale phylogenetics. Structure prediction revealed that the previously described core structure can be found for more than 5000 sequences in a wide variety of taxa within the eukaryotes, indicating that the core secondary structure is indeed conserved. This conserved structure allowed an automated alignment of extremely divergent sequences as exemplified for the ITS2 sequences of a ctenophorean eumetazoon and a volvocalean green alga. All classified sequences, together with their structures can be accessed at http://www.biozentrum.uni-wuerzburg.de/bioinformatik/projects/ITS2.html. Furthermore, we found that, although sample sequences are known for most major taxa, there exists a profound divergence in coverage, which might become a hindrance for general usage. In summary, our analysis strengthens the potential of ITS2 as a general phylogenetic marker and provides a data source for further ITS2-based analyses.     

用ITS序列研究杨属各组之间的系统发育关系

ITS sequences of 15 representative species of five sections inthe genus Populus L. were determined. By using direct sequencing of PCR product, it was found that the fragments of internal transcribed spacers (ITS) are about 594 bp in length. The length of ITS-1 and ITS-2 is about 220 bp and 210 bp, respectively, while that of 5.8s is 164 bp. Its G+C content is about 69.0%. The number of phylogenetically informative loci is higher in ITS-2 than in ITS-1. Transversion and transition are two main factors that drive the ITS evolution, and more insertions and deletions occurred in ITS-2. Taking Salix matsudana Koidz. and Salix suchowensis Cheng as outgroups, phylogenetic analysis of ITS sequences using PAUP 4.0 software indicated that Populus is monophyletic group and can be divided into two main clades. One is the section Leuce, and the other is the remaining sections.     

IWoCS: analyzing ribosomal intergenic transcribed spacers configuration and taxonomic relationships

MOTIVATION: Lately the use of 16S-23S Intergenic Transcribed Spacer (ITS) sequences for bacterial typing purposes has increased. The presence of conserved regions like tRNA genes or boxes together with hypervariable regions allows performing intraspecific discrimination of very close bacterial strains. On the other hand this mosaic of variability makes the ITS a sequence difficult to analyze and compare. RESULTS: A software to study ITSs by a Word Count based System (IWoCS) is proposed. A large dataset of ITS was created (comprising 7355 sequences). A database indicating all the occurrences of possible n-mers (tags), describing each ITS sequence, was created (with n going from 5 to 13) including 32 061 819 entries. The database allows to analyze ITS sequences submitted by users using a web-based interface. The abundance in the database of each n-mer is given in a one-base sliding frame. A dominance plot reflects how common the tags are within different taxonomic levels. The obtained profile identifies highly repeated tags as evolutionarily conserved regions (like tRNA or boxes) or low frequency tags as regions specifically associated to taxonomic groups. The study of the dominance and abundance profiles combined with the taxonomy reports provides a novel tool for the use of the ITS in bacteria typing and identification. AVAILABILITY: The database is freely accessible at http://egg.umh.es/iwocs/.     

Phylogenetic Relationship ofPopulusSections by ITS Sequence Analysis

ITS sequences of 15 representative species of five sections in the genus Populus L. were determined. By using direct sequencing of PCR product, it was found that the fragments of internal transcribed spacers (ITS) are about 594 bp in length. The length of ITS-1 and ITS-2 is about 220 bp and 210 bp, respectively, while that of 5.8s is 164 bp. Its G+C content is about 69.0%. The number of phylogenetically informative loci is higher in ITS-2 than in ITS-1. Transversion and transition are two main factors that drive the ITS evolution, and more insertions and deletions occurred in ITS-2. Taking Salix matsudana Koidz. and Salix suchowensis Cheng as outgroups, phylogenetic analysis of ITS sequences using PAUP 4.0 software indicated that Populus is monophyletic group and can be divided into two main clades. One is the section Leuce , and the other is the remaining sections.     

Revisiting the rDNA sequence diversity of a natural population of the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus<Emphasis Type="Italic"> Acaulospora colossica</Emphasis>

In 1999, the diversity of a field population of the arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungus Acaulospora colossica was characterized using DNA sequence data. Since 1999, AM fungal sequences have accumulated rapidly within public databases. Moreover, novel phylogenetic tools have been developed and can be used to interpret the data. A second analysis of those sequences collected in 1999 demonstrates that while the majority of the sequences are, in fact, sequences of A. colossica; a minority of the sequences still cannot be identified with confidence. Those sequences identified as A. colossica can be used to show that (1) the nuclear rDNA ITS regions are remarkably diverse, and (2) sequences isolated from different spores of the same site may be more closely related to each other than to sequences of other sites, so that the genetic diversity of an AM fungal field population may be spatially structured; however, identical sequences can also be recovered from different sites.     

Interstitial telomere repeats as markers of evolutionary changes in the mammalian karyotype: human chromosome 2

Telomer repeats represented by hexamer (TTAGGG)n at chromosome termini are required for correct function and chromosome stability. At the same time, interstitial telomer sequence (ITS) located far from the chromosome ends are known for several mammalian genomes, including the human genome. It is assumed that these repeats mark the points of fusion or other chromosome reconstructions of ancestors. Exact localization of all interstitial telomer sequences in the genome could greatly improve our understanding of the mechanism of karyotype evolution and species origin. We have developed a software for a search of interstitial telomer sequences in complete sequences of mammalian genomes. We have demonstrated the evolutionary significance of repeats by an example of human chromosome 2. The results and supplementary materials are available at the site of the Institute of Cytology and Genetics: http://www.bionet.nsc.ru/labs/theorylabmain/orlov/telomere/.     

赤潮棕囊藻(Phaeocystis globosa)rDNA ITS区序列变异与二级结构分析

测定了南海球形棕囊藻香港株P1、P2和湛江株ZhJ1的rDNAITS区序列(含5.8srDNA),结合Gen Bank的13条同源序列,比对长度为904bp,变异位点271个,简约信息位点221个,平均(A+T)(34.5%)<(G+C)(65.4%).藻株P1、P2和ZhJ1序列存在变异位点20个,序列间相似性为97.9%～98.5%.ITS序列在种间和种内的解析度高于18srDNA和28srDNA基因;构建的NJ树、MP树、贝叶斯推断系统树的结构是一致的,不同种类的棕囊藻单独聚类,不同地理来源的球形棕囊藻混杂分布但相同地理来源的藻株多聚类在一起.RNA二级结构显示,不同藻种间5.8srDNA区结构基本一致,表现出属的特异性;ITS1、2区结构表现较大的种间差异,表明ITS区RNA二级结构可为棕囊藻分类鉴定提供有用的分子结构信息.