Dataset Information

Identification of cultured isolates of clinically important yeast species using fluorescent fragment length analysis of the amplified internally transcribed rRNA spacer 2 region (ITS2).

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND:The number of patients candidate to yeast infection has increased during the last years. Also the variety of species of clinical importance has increased. Correct species identification is often important for efficient therapy, but is based on phenotypic features and is sometimes time-consuming and depends largely on the expertise of technicians. Therefore, we evaluated the feasability of PCR-based amplification of the Internally Transcribed Spacer region 2, followed by fragment size analysis on the ABI Prism 310 for the identification of clinically important yeasts. RESULTS:A rapid DNA-extraction method, based on simple boiling freezing was introduced. Of the 25 species tested, 22 could be identified unambiguously by scoring the length of the ITS2-region. No distinction could be made between the species T. asteroides and T. inkin and between T. mucoides and T. ovoides. The two varieties of Cryptococcus neoformans (var. neoformans and var. gattii) could be differentiated from each other due to a one bp length difference of the ITS2 fragment. The three C. laurentii isolates were split in two groups according to their ITS2-fragment lengths, in correspondence with the phylogenetic groups described previously. Since the obtained fragment lenghts compared well to those described previously, an internationally usable library of ITS2 fragment lengths can be constructed. CONCLUSIONS:The existing ITS2 size based library enables identification of most of the clinically important yeast species, within 6 hours starting from a single colony, can be easily updated when new species are described. Data can be exchanged between laboratories.

SUBMITTER: De Baere T

PROVIDER: S-EPMC117793 | biostudies-literature | 2002 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Identification of cultured isolates of clinically important yeast species using fluorescent fragment length analysis of the amplified internally transcribed rRNA spacer 2 region (ITS2).

De Baere Thierry T Claeys Geert G Swinne Danielle D Verschraegen Gerda G Muylaert An A Massonet Caroline C Vaneechoutte Mario M

BMC microbiology 20020725

<h4>Background</h4>The number of patients candidate to yeast infection has increased during the last years. Also the variety of species of clinical importance has increased. Correct species identification is often important for efficient therapy, but is based on phenotypic features and is sometimes time-consuming and depends largely on the expertise of technicians. Therefore, we evaluated the feasability of PCR-based amplification of the Internally Transcribed Spacer region 2, followed by fragme ...[more]

PMID: 12139769

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Project description:BackgroundChloroplast-encoded genes (matK and rbcL) have been formally proposed for use in DNA barcoding efforts targeting embryophytes. Extending such a protocol to chlorophytan green algae, though, is fraught with problems including non homology (matK) and heterogeneity that prevents the creation of a universal PCR toolkit (rbcL). Some have advocated the use of the nuclear-encoded, internal transcribed spacer two (ITS2) as an alternative to the traditional chloroplast markers. However, the ITS2 is broadly perceived to be insufficiently conserved or to be confounded by introgression or biparental inheritance patterns, precluding its broad use in phylogenetic reconstruction or as a DNA barcode. A growing body of evidence has shown that simultaneous analysis of nucleotide data with secondary structure information can overcome at least some of the limitations of ITS2. The goal of this investigation was to assess the feasibility of an automated, sequence-structure approach for analysis of IT2 data from a large sampling of phylum Chlorophyta.Methodology/principal findingsSequences and secondary structures from 591 chlorophycean, 741 trebouxiophycean and 938 ulvophycean algae, all obtained from the ITS2 Database, were aligned using a sequence structure-specific scoring matrix. Phylogenetic relationships were reconstructed by Profile Neighbor-Joining coupled with a sequence structure-specific, general time reversible substitution model. Results from analyses of the ITS2 data were robust at multiple nodes and showed considerable congruence with results from published phylogenetic analyses.Conclusions/significanceOur observations on the power of automated, sequence-structure analyses of ITS2 to reconstruct phylum-level phylogenies of the green algae validate this approach to assessing diversity for large sets of chlorophytan taxa. Moreover, our results indicate that objections to the use of ITS2 for DNA barcoding should be weighed against the utility of an automated, data analysis approach with demonstrated power to reconstruct evolutionary patterns for highly divergent lineages.

Project description:Molecular-based taxonomy, specifically DNA barcoding, has streamlined organism identification. For land plants, the recommended 2-locus barcode of rbcL and matK is not suitable for all groups, thus the second subunit of the nuclear internal transcribed spacer (ITS2) has received attention as a possible alternative. To date, evaluations of ITS2 have mostly been limited in scope to specific plant orders/families and single source material. Prior to using ITS2 to routinely characterize land plants present in environmental samples (i.e., DNA metabarcoding), a wet lab protocol optimized for bulk sample types is needed. To address this gap, in this study we determined the broad recoverability across land plants when using published ITS2 primer pairs, and subsequently optimized the PCR reaction constituents and cycling conditions for the best two performing primer pairs (ITS2F/ITSp4 and ITSp3/ITSu4). Using these conditions, both primer pairs were used to characterize land plants present in 17 diverse soils collected from across the US. The resulting PCR amplicons were prepared into libraries and pooled for sequencing on an Illumina® MiniSeq. Our existing bioinformatics workflow was used to process raw sequencing data and taxonomically assign unique ITS2 plant sequences by comparison to GenBank. Given strict quality criteria were imposed on sequences for inclusion in data analysis, only 43.6% and 7.5% of sequences from ITS2F/ITSp4 and ITSp3/ITSu4 respectively remained for taxonomic comparisons; ~7-11% of sequences originated from fungal co-amplification. The number of orders and families recovered did differ between primer pairs, with ITS2F/ITSp4 consistently outperforming ITSp3/ITSu4 by >15%. Primer pair bias was observed in the recovery of certain taxonomic groups; ITS2F/ITSp4 preferentially recovered flowering plants and grasses, whereas ITSp3/ITSu4 recovered more moss taxa. To maximize data recovery and reduce potential bias, we advocate that studies using ITS2 to characterize land plants from environmental samples such as soil use a multiple primer pair approach.

Dataset Information

Identification of cultured isolates of clinically important yeast species using fluorescent fragment length analysis of the amplified internally transcribed rRNA spacer 2 region (ITS2).

Publications

Identification of cultured isolates of clinically important yeast species using fluorescent fragment length analysis of the amplified internally transcribed rRNA spacer 2 region (ITS2).

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