NEW RECORDS OF FUNGAL ENDOPHYTES FROM UNILORIN SUGARCANE PLANTATION USING INTERNAL TRANSCRIBED SPACER GENE SEQUENCES

Abstract

Fungal endophytes are beneficial microbes that confer an added advantage to plants by colonizing their intercellular spaces without causing any harm. Instead, they produce secondary metabolites that play a considerable role in improving the medicinal qualities and protection of the host plants. There are several reports on fungal endophytes isolated from different plants but no report yet on fungal endophytes of Blighia sapida and Euphorbia heterophylla. These two plants were found growing in the Unilorin Sugarcane plantation as weeds. Leaf samples were collected from the plants, sterilized, and cultured on potato dextrose agar (PDA) for seven days. Emerging fungal mycelia from the leaves were subcultured to obtain pure culture and used for DNA extraction. We used the Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) region gene sequence analysis of fungi DNA for the identification of two new records of isolated fungal endophytes of these two plants. The extracted DNA was amplified using Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), sequenced and analyzed using the computer softwares; AliView and MEGAX. Molecular phylogeny inferred using maximum likelihood phylogenetic tree based on the ITS DNA sequences showed the relationship between the isolated fungal endophyte and the closest identified relatives from NCBI GenBank. Fungal endophyte isolated from B. sapida had the highest sequence similarity to Curvularia lunata, and isolate from E. heterophylla had the highest similarity to Chaetomium globosum. These two results represent the first reports of the fungal isolates as new records of endophytes from their respective host plant. The implications of these new records are fully discussed.