Metal tolerance of Río Tinto fungi.

Abstract

Southwest Spain's Río Tinto is a stressful acidic microbial habitat with a noticeably high concentration of toxic heavy metals. Nevertheless, it has an unexpected degree of eukaryotic diversity in its basin, with a high diversity of fungal saprotrophs. Although some studies on the eukaryotic diversity in Rio Tinto have been published, none of them used molecular methodologies to describe the fungal diversity and taxonomic affiliations that emerge along the river in different seasons. The aim of the present study was to isolate and describe the seasonal diversity of the fungal community in the Río Tinto basin and its correlation with the physicochemical parameters existing along the river's course. The taxonomic affiliation of 359 fungal isolates, based on the complete internal transcribed spacer DNA sequences, revealed a high degree of diversity, identifying species belonging primarily to the phylum Ascomycota, but representatives of the Basidiomycota and Mucoromycota phyla were also present. In total, 40 representative isolates along the river were evaluated for their tolerance to toxic heavy metals. Some of the isolates were able to grow in the presence of 1000 mM of Cu²⁺, 750 mM of As⁵⁺ and Cd²⁺, and 100 mM of Co²⁺, Ni²⁺, and Pb²⁺.