Biodiversity of cold-adapted yeasts from glacial meltwater rivers in Patagonia, Argentina

Abstract

The occurrence of culturable yeasts in glacial meltwater from the Frías, Castaño Overo and Río Manso glaciers, located on Mount Tronador in the Nahuel Huapi National Park (Northwestern Patagonia, Argentina) is presented. Subsurface water samples were filtered for colony counting and yeast isolation. The total yeast count ranged between 6 and 360 CFU L(-1). Physiologic and molecular methods were employed to identify 86 yeast isolates. In agreement with yeast diversity data from studies for Antarctic and Alpine glaciers, the genera Cryptococcus, Leucosporidiella, Dioszegia, Rhodotorula, Rhodosporidium, Mrakia, Sporobolomyces, Udeniomyces and Candida were found. Cryptococcus and Leucosporidiella accounted for 50% and 20% of the total number of strains, respectively. Among 21 identified yeast species, Cryptococcus sp. 1 and Leucosporidiella fragaria were the most frequent. The typically psychrophilic Mrakia yeast strain and three new yeast species, yet to be described, were also isolated. All yeast strains were able to grow at 5, 10, and 15 degrees C. Among yeast strains expressing extracellular enzymatic activity, higher proteolytic and lipolytic activities were obtained at 4 degrees C than at 20 degrees C.

Candida andamanensis sp. nov., Candida laemsonensis sp. nov. and Candida ranongensis sp. nov., anamorphic yeast species isolated from estuarine waters in a Thai mangrove forest

“…The type strain is RV5 Yeasts in the genus Candida are distributed widely in both terrestrial and aquatic habitats. In aquatic habitats, Candida strains have been found in fresh water, estuarine water and sea water (Cooke et al, 1960;Hagler & Ahearn, 1981Spencer & Spencer, 1997;de Almeida, 2005;Butinar et al, 2005;Nagahama, 2006;de García et al, 2007;Limtong et al, 2007Limtong et al, , 2008Boonmak et al, 2009;Limtong et al, 2010). Mangrove forests, or intertidal forests, are plant communities in saline coastal habitats distributed over a wide range of geographical zones (Aksornkoae, 1999).…”

Rhodotorula portillonensis sp. nov., a basidiomycetous yeast isolated from Antarctic shallow-water marine sediment

“…CBS 9087 and CBS 9086 were isolated from water in Antarctica. It is interesting to note that other strains of R. laryngis (not included in the phylogenetic trees) were isolated from children's faeces in Hungary (CBS 5695), seawater in Sweden (CBS 8020), grapes in Australia (Prakitchaiwattana et al, 2004), nectarine trees in USA (Janisiewicz et al, 2010), the Dead Sea (Butinar et al, 2005), glaciers and freshwater habitats in Argentina and Italy (de García et al, 2007;Turchetti et al, 2008;Libkind et al, 2010), and a soil sample from King George Island in Antarctica (Carrasco et al, 2012). Furthermore, other strains of R. pinicola (not included in the phylogenetic trees) were isolated from freshwater habitats in Argentina (Libkind et al, 2003(Libkind et al, , 2010, wines in Greece (Nisiotou & Gibson, 2005), an industrial malting ecosystem in Finland (Laitila et al, 2006), nectarine trees in USA (Janisiewicz et al, 2010) and marine sponges from Fildes Bay in Antarctica (Vaca et al, 2013).…”

Dioszegia rishiriensis sp. nov., a novel yeast species from soil collected on Rishiri Island, Hokkaido, Japan

“…Although the type strain of D. hungarica was isolated from soil, in Tihany, Hungary (Zsolt, 1957), this species is cosmopolitan and has been isolated from other materials, for example, leaves in Hungary (M. Takashima, unpublished results), Portugal (Inácio et al, 2005) and China (Wang et al, 2008) and glacial melt streams of Patagonia, Argentina (de García et al, 2007), and Antarctica (Vishniac, 2006b). In contrast, only these two strains of this novel species have been isolated, although we used not only soils but also plant materials as isolation sources, including samples from the Minamihama marsh area where the type strain was isolated.…”