Metabarcoding of insect-associated fungal communities: a comparison of internal transcribed spacer (ITS) and large-subunit (LSU) rRNA markers.

ABSTRACT: Full taxonomic characterisation of fungal communities is necessary for establishing ecological associations and early detection of pathogens and invasive species. Complex communities of fungi are regularly characterised by metabarcoding using the Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) and the Large-Subunit (LSU) gene of the rRNA locus, but reliance on a single short sequence fragment limits the confidence of identification. Here we link metabarcoding from the ITS2 and LSU D1-D2 regions to characterise fungal communities associated with bark beetles (Scolytinae), the likely vectors of several tree pathogens. Both markers revealed similar patterns of overall species richness and response to key variables (beetle species, forest type), but identification against the respective reference databases

SUBMITTER: Ceballos-Escalera A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8924126 | biostudies-literature | 2022

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature